The Ghost of Jack Delance
by Elizabeth Joan-hbndgirl
Summary: A trip to Emerson for the annual Winter Festival takes a ghostly turn when Nancy's footsteps begin to be dogged by the ghost of a boy who drowned in the river years before.
1. A Ghost Story

J.M.J.

_Author's note: Hi, all! After taking a nearly two-month break from posting, I'm ready for another story. I hope you like it!_

_This story is just Nancy. The Hardy Boys will not be making an appearance. I feel like it's about time I give Nancy & Co. the love they deserve. As you can tell from the title, this is a ghost mystery. I realized that I haven't yet written a ghost story, and right around Halloween is as good a time as any, even though it takes place in December rather than October. I'm trying to make this feel more like one of the classic Nancy Drew Mysteries, so Nancy, Bess, and George are all eighteen, and Ned, Burt, and Dave are nineteen, or thereabouts. When I was writing_ Shadow Ranch_, having a regular posting schedule worked well, so I think I will follow the same schedule here: a chapter every Tuesday and Friday._

_I try not to beg for reviews as an author, since that usually annoys me when I'm a reader, but I will say that I do appreciate any and all reviews very, very much and I would love to hear what you think. Enjoy!_

_**The Ghost of Jack Delance**_

**Chapter I**

**A Ghost Story**

Most of the drivers on the road between River Heights and Emerson that day were regretting that they hadn't the Weather Service's storm warning that day. The blizzard that they had predicted was here in all its predicted fury, and then some. Perhaps the only ones bold enough (or, it may be, young and foolish enough) not to regret making the trek today were the three girls in the blue convertible that were making their way along cheerfully, if very, very slowly.

"One good thing about driving in snow is that all the potholes are filled in," George Fayne observed as she leaned comfortably back against the heated seat. She was eighteen with short, brown hair and an easy-going nature.

"Just so long as we don't hit black ice," her cousin, Bess Marvin, said. She was blonde and tended to be more nervous and cautious than George. Even so, she had been just as intent on this trip as her two companions.

"We'll be fine, Bess," the third girl in the party spoke up. She was Nancy Drew, a titian-haired girl who tended to be the leader of the trio, and on this occasion, like on many others, the girls were riding in her car. "We'll be late, but we'll be fine."

"Should we call the boys again and let them know we're still all right?" Bess asked.

George rolled her eyes good naturedly. "It's only been, what? Fifteen minutes? Anyway, even on these roads, we're bound to get to Emerson in a half hour or so."

"If you say so," Bess replied, but she was unconvinced.

George, thinking it would be better to change the subject, turned to Nancy. "So, how about these ghost sightings the guys told us about? Any theories yet?"

Nancy laughed. She spent most of her time solving mysteries as an amateur detective, and so when her boyfriend, Ned Nickerson, had mentioned that a ghost had been making appearances in the woods near Emerson college, where Ned went to school, Nancy had immediately made up her mind to investigate when she, Bess, and George went up to Emerson for a visit. They had been planning on visiting, anyway. Bess's boyfriend, Dave Evans, and George's boyfriend, Burt Eddleton, were also students at Emerson, and the boys had invited them for the annual Winter Festival, which took place a couple of weeks before finals and gave the students a chance to relax and blow off some steam before buckling down on their studies.

"It's a little soon to start formulating theories," Nancy told her. "I'd like to have a few more facts first. I got the feeling that Ned was purposely holding back some details."

"He probably wanted to tell you about them in person," Bess said. She leaned forward to be closer to the other two, since she had lost the "rock, paper, scissors" bout that she and George had used to decide who got to sit in front. "Dave told me that there's a really sad legend about the ghost, but then he refused to say another word about it."

"Typical." George shook her head.

"I don't suppose Burt was any more loose-lipped?" Nancy asked her.

George made a wry face. "Not even as much as usual. I think he was about to say something more, but Dave was in the same room and grabbed the phone away from him before he could."

The other girls chuckled, as they could easily imagine the scene. It turned the conversation to more cheerful topics, and the rest of the drive went by pleasantly and safely enough. Even so, Nancy couldn't help continuing to wonder about the ghost and she wished that the boys hadn't been so secretive about it.

Once they reached the Omega Chi Epsilon House at Emerson College, Nancy found a parking space and the girls made a dash for the door, leaving their bags in the car. They stopped in the foyer to stamp the snow from their boots and shake it out of their hair.

The door from the foyer to the big common area of the fraternity was locked, but it was glass and a young man standing on the other side of it opened the door for them.

"How did you get here through all that snow?" he asked. "When Ned, Burt, and Dave told me you were still coming, I thought you were crazy."

"Thanks for the compliment, Liam," George replied wryly. The girls had met Liam Rodgers, along with most of the other Omega Chi Epsilon men on other visits.

At that moment, Ned, Burt, and Dave came down the stairs and enthusiastically greeted the girls. Ned was the tallest of three with brown hair and eyes and a friendly smile. Dave was blond and a great jokester, while dark-haired Burt was short but proficient at sports.

"I'm glad you girls got through okay," Ned said after the greetings were over. He looked out the window. "This is one of the worst storms I've seen up here."

"I hope it isn't going to ruin the Winter Festival," Bess commented.

"I doubt it," Dave assured her. "It's supposed to blow over by tonight. I think it's already letting up a little. All the more it will do is make sure we have plenty of snow for the festival, which is always a good thing."

"Yeah, well, if you guys were hoping that the storm was going to let you break the rules about overnight guests, I guess it quashes that hope," Liam said with a mischievous grin.

Nancy and Bess blushed, although George's cheeks reddened more with annoyance than embarrassment.

"Why don't you just go mind your own business, Liam?" she asked.

Liam slunk off, still snickering.

"Sorry about that, girls," Dave said. "Some of the guys around here really need to grow up. Anyway, we do have a hotel room booked for you for the weekend. It's at the nicest hotel in town, but, uh, I hope you don't mind that we booked a suite rather individual rooms. College budgets and all, you know."

"We don't mind at all," Nancy assured him. "And we know all about college budgets. That's why we're paying you back for the room. No arguments. We're not about to stand around and watch you three have to drop out of college because you've spent all your money on us."

"We're going to have to talk about that a little more," Ned replied. "Anyway, I think Dave's right and the storm is letting up. What do you say to a dinner at a real restaurant instead of the caf'?"

"And we're paying for it no matter what it costs. No arguments there," Burt added.

George nodded. "We pay for the room and you pay for the dinner. Sounds fair to me."

They waited a little longer, and within the next half hour, the storm had died down completely and snow plows were out. Nancy and Ned drove Nancy's car downtown, while Bess, Dave, George, and Burt followed them in Dave's car. They stopped at a cozy, little restaurant, not far from the hotel where the girls would be staying, which was on the outskirts of town. Because of the conditions, it wasn't busy, and so they were seated immediately and a waitress came to give them their menus.

Nancy didn't pick hers up right away, though. "Okay, guys, you know we're dying of curiosity. Why don't you tell us about this ghost?"

"Well…" Ned grinned at the other two boys. "It's more of a story for a campfire than a restaurant, but I guess we might as well tell you about it. The ghost is the Ghost of Jack Delance."

"Is that name supposed to mean something to us?" George asked.

"Probably not," Ned admitted. "The story's pretty popular with the locals up here, and Burt and Dave and I have heard it from working as summer camp counselors down on the lake."

"You see," Burt took up the story, "it happened in the river just below Pine Hill. Of course, you already know that the river runs right through the town of Emerson before it empties into the lake. It's the town's one ghost story, so it's pretty much a staple of campfire stories at the camp."

"Anyway," Ned went on, "the story goes that there was a family of settlers named Delance who lived just at the base of Pine Hill. If it was daylight, you'd be able to see the spot from here. They had several children, including a fifteen-year-old son named Jack. The winter that year kept switching between being harsh and not, and even though the river froze over, everyone knew that it wasn't very solid."

"All the kids were warned to stay off the ice." Dave took up the story. "But the Delance children wanted to ice skate, so they kept sneaking out when their parents weren't around or even after dark to ice skate. As you know, the river's pretty wide there, so they kept close to the shore, and they were always fine."

"Until, one night when there was a full moon and they snuck out of the house," Burt said. "It had been an especially cold day, and so the kids were feeling a little bolder. One of Jack's younger brothers skated right out into the middle of the river, and then they all heard an ominous crack. The other kids yelled to the one who had skated out into the middle to come back, but he was too afraid to move. Finally, Jack skated out to rescue him. He managed to push his brother to safety, but before he could get there himself, the ice cracked again. This time, it cracked right underneath Jack's feet and he fell through. The other kids screamed for help and tried to rescue him, but the current must have carried him under the ice and trapped him there immediately, because he never surfaced again."

Bess shivered. "That's a terrible story."

"I warned you that it was sad," Dave reminded her.

"So Jack is now a ghost?" George asked.

"Mm-hmm," Ned replied. "It wasn't very long before people started reporting seeing him in the woods or skating on the river. A few people claimed to have gotten close to him. They said that he was covered in ice and no matter what time of year it was, you could see his breath like it was a cold day."

"Hold on," George objected. "A ghost doesn't breathe. That's part of the point."

Ned shrugged. "I'm just telling you what I've been told. I'm sure there wasn't anything in those early ghost sightings. They certainly didn't last all that long. As far as I've heard, it's been more than seventy years since anyone has reported seeing Jack's ghost, until now, anyway. All the sudden, several people are claiming to have seen him, or at least, to have seen an eerie light or a vague figure or something that they claim is ghostly."

"It's most likely a few imaginations running away with people and a few other people trying to get in on the fun," Nancy said.

"Probably," Ned agreed, "but if I know you, you're going to look into it anyway."

Nancy grinned and nodded. "You do know me pretty well."

The conversation for the rest of dinner revolved around theories of what other explanations there could be for the so-called ghostly activity. If it was manmade, the only motive any of them could think of that began to make sense was that it was a prank.

"It could always be a real ghost," Dave suggested with a grin.

Burt playfully swatted at him. "Yeah, and it could also be Bigfoot."

The others laughed. When the meal was over and they were walking back out to the cars, Nancy paused for a moment to take in the scene. Even the clouds had rolled away now, and a pale moon, a few nights away from being full, was reflecting off the snow and giving the world a dreamy, magical sort of look.

The restaurant was on a hill, and the river was down below it. Nancy looked down that way toward the base of Pine Hill and the scene of the tragedy many years before. Then she took a step back. A figure, glowing with a pale blue light, was moving along the frozen river.


	2. The Investigation Begins

J.M.J.

_Author's note: Thank you so much for continuing to read this story! I hope you're enjoying it. Thank you especially to those who left reviews. Angelicalkiss, I'm thrilled to see you back again. Aurora Mandeville, I'm delighted that you're reading. I'm glad you both like ghost stories, too. ;)_

**Chapter II**

**The Investigation Begins**

Nancy stared at the bluish figure down on the river, and a strange shiver ran up her spine. She didn't believe in ghosts and since this couldn't possibly be her imagination, there was only one explanation: someone was playing ghost, and that meant that there really was a mystery to solve.

It was a straight shot down the hill to the river. In the summertime, Nancy probably could have run all the way there. The deep snow would make that impossible now, but Nancy was still determined to get there as fast as she could. She plunged straight out of the parking lot, calling out at the same time, "Ned? Do you see that?"

Ned came barreling after her. "What is that?"

The deep snow quickly slowed them down to a trudge. They had gotten no more than a few yards before the figure disappeared.

"Guys! What's going on?" George shouted from the parking lot.

Nancy stopped and tried to decide what to do. Walking all the way down to the river and back in this snow would be exhausting and it was dark and cold. As much as Nancy wanted to see if she could find any clues to the glowing figure, she realized that now and in this way wasn't the best idea.

"Come on, Ned. I guess there's no use now."

Hand in hand, they trudged back up to the parking lot. Their friends were waiting for them, and once they arrived, George repeated her question. Nancy explained about the glowing figure.

"Do you think it was the ghost?" Bess asked.

"I think it was supposed to be the ghost," Nancy replied. "If that's the case, it means that someone is purposely trying to make it look like there's a ghost haunting Emerson."

"I don't see why anyone would bother," Burt said. "I mean, what would anyone have to gain around here?"

"Who owns that property where the ghost appears?" Nancy asked. "A lot of the supposed haunting cases I've worked took place on a property with some hidden value and the perpetrator was trying to scare the owner into selling it to them cheap."

"I think that property just belongs to the city of Emerson," Ned told her. "Tomorrow is Friday, so all the county offices will be open. You could find out about it then."

"We'll do that," Nancy agreed.

NDNDNDNDND

A few minutes after nine the next morning found Nancy, Bess, and George at the county Assessor's Office, located in the courthouse. The boys would have accompanied them, but they all had nine o'clock classes to attend. An older woman was perched behind the desk in the Assessor's Office, and she peered at the girls over her glasses as they walked in. Then she smiled at them.

"Hello, there. What can I do for you this morning?"

Nancy glanced at the woman's nametag, which identified her as Susan, and smiled back. "Hi. We just had a couple of questions about a piece of property. First off, we want to learn who owns it."

"Do you have the address?" Susan asked.

"No," Nancy said. "It's not in town. It's the piece right down off of Pine Hill by the river, about a mile up from the lake."

"Oh." Susan gave the girls a questioning look. "That property belongs to the city. You're more than welcome to go there, of course, if that's what you're wondering. Still, I have to warn you that there's something peculiar going on there. You're not ghost hunters, are you?"

"Not exactly," Nancy replied.

"Nancy did see something down there last night, though," Bess spoke up. "Some of our friends who are going to college here told us that other people have been seeing strange lights and things around there, too."

"That's what people are saying," Susan agreed. "I don't really believe in ghosts, but for as many people as are saying they've seen something, I have admit there's probably something going on."

"Have there been that many sightings?" Nancy asked.

Susan shrugged. "A dozen or so in the last couple weeks, which is quite a few, really. I suspect someone playing a prank myself, but if that's the case, it's only a matter of time before someone catches them red-handed. A bunch of high school and college kids have been poking around down there ever since it all started."

"So the 'ghost' isn't really scaring anybody," George said. "If anything, it's attracting more people to that area."

The girls looked at one another in consternation. That seemed to debunk Nancy's theory about the "ghost" trying to scare people away.

"Just a couple more questions," Nancy said. "How much is that property assessed at?"

Susan named a fairly low figure. "It's not worth very much, considering that there are no buildings or improvements of any kind on that property, at least not anymore."

"That property used to belong to some settlers, right?" Nancy asked. "Do you know how the city came to own it?"

"That I'm not sure about," Susan said. "It's belonged to the city for as long as I can remember. I can look it up." She typed a few words into her computer and after a few minutes said, "It looks like the city bought it from a Marilyn Delance in 1954. I can't imagine why, since they've never anything with it, but I don't have any way of looking into that."

"That's all right," Nancy assured her. "Thank you."

The girls went outside the courthouse before discussing what they had learned. It hadn't snowed any more the night before, but the air was frigid and there were drifts in the yard of the courthouse that must have been more than five feet deep.

"I wonder how that 'ghost' got down to the river last night," Nancy said. "I've never noticed any road leading down that way, and even if there was, I doubt it would have been plowed out yet so soon after the blizzard."

"Whatever they're up to, it must be something they think is important." Bess wrapped her arms around herself and shivered. "It's way too cold to go to all that bother just for a prank."

"Yeah, but if the property isn't particularly valuable, what are they up to?" George asked.

"Maybe they discovered gold there that no one else knows about," Bess suggested.

"But they're not going to scare the city into selling," George reminded her. "The property isn't being used for anything, anyway, so it doesn't matter if people are too scared to go there. Besides, it doesn't sound like people are too scared."

"They're attracting people rather than scaring them away," Nancy mused. "There aren't many illegal activities that you would _want_ people around."

Bess's eyes widened. "What if they're attracting people down there to kidnap them or murder them or something?"

"Considering that no one has been kidnapped or murdered, I doubt it," George told her, rolling her eyes.

"Unless they're after someone specific that they think might come to look into the ghost," Nancy said, "but I don't think it's very likely. There are a lot of less showy and more sure ways to kidnap someone than to try to lure them into the woods with a ghost." She paused to think it over a little longer. "We're nowhere close to being able to figure out _why_ someone is playing ghost, so let's focus on _how_ they're doing it. The person had to have gotten down to the river somehow and gotten back up to it. Finding out how they did that will be a good start. It's too bad none of us thought to bring snowshoes."

"If the boys hadn't been so secretive about all this, we might have," Bess complained.

"There's bound to be someplace we can rent snowshoes," George said. "There's a sporting goods store just up the street. If they don't have any to rent, maybe they can tell us who would."

Even though it was only a few blocks, the girls decided to take the car. Bess took the front passenger seat and cranked the heat up, but it was only starting to warm up by the time Nancy stopped in front of the sporting goods store.

Fortunately, the store did rent snowshoes, and so the girls were each fitted out with a pair. They decided to rent them for the whole weekend just in case the mystery would take them out into the woods more than just this one time.

George checked the time on her smartphone as they were walking out of the store. "The boys will be getting out of class before we'll be able to get back if we hike out there now."

"Let's wait for them," Bess suggested. "After all, we did come up here to see them."

Nancy would have rather gone to investigate immediately since waiting for the boys would mean that they wouldn't have time before the festival began at noon. What with all the events that would be happening that afternoon, Nancy didn't think it would be fair to tear her friends away, especially since the festival was the major reason for their visit.

"Okay," she agreed finally, making an effort to keep any reluctance out of her voice.

They met the boys after class and then, an hour later, they gathered in the big lawn on one side of Emerson College's campus for the opening ceremony, which was followed by lunch. After that, there was a skating rink and games for kids and the visitors were encouraged to walk around town and see the ice sculptures that locals had been working on for the last few days.

It was a great deal of fun and the "ghost" was forgotten by nearly everyone, except for Nancy. Every now and again, she would cast a wistful glance toward the river.

Ned noticed and came to put his arm around her. "Do you want to go investigate now?"

Nancy smiled, but she said, "I don't want to tear you away from this. I know how much you've been looking forward to this festival."

"Yeah, but hunting ghosts with you is more fun than a festival any day of the week," Ned replied. "Besides, I know you're not going to really enjoy a minute of it as long as there's some bit of detective work you could be doing."

Without giving Nancy another chance to protest, he trotted ahead to catch up with the other four, who had gotten ahead of them as they had been walking. He told them that he and Nancy were heading out to go down to the river.

"Count me in," Burt said. "It's been way too long since I've gotten to help with a mystery."

"We'd all better go," George added. "You and Nancy always get into trouble when we let you go sleuthing alone."

Ned chuckled, but he could hardly deny it.

They all piled into Dave's car, which was a small SUV and the best choice of vehicle they had for traveling over snowy roads. With four people in the back seat, there weren't seatbelts for everyone, but it was only a short way to go and Dave promised to drive slowly.

"There's a road up ahead here that will get us pretty close to the river," Burt said, pointing over Dave's shoulder to direct him. "We'll have to snowshoe the last little bit, though."

"Lucky you boys have your own snowshoes," Bess observed.

When they judged that they had gotten as close as they could to the spot where the "ghost" had appeared, Dave parked the SUV and everyone got out to begin strapping on their snowshoes.

Burt exaggerated stretching his legs and back. "I thought I was going to get bent into a pretzel being packed in there like a sardine."

"You can sit in the front on the way back," Bess offered him.

George playfully punched her boyfriend's shoulder. "He was fine. He's just complaining because he can."

"Well, I've got to admit the company was pretty good," Burt conceded.

Since they were only about a quarter of a mile from the river, it didn't take them long to reach its banks. There were no footprints or signs of any kind on this side.

"That's weird," Dave said, frowning as he looked around him. "There's no road on the other side of the river, so there's really no place that so-called 'ghost' could have gone there. I guess there must have still been enough wind last night to cover his prints, since it certainly didn't snow anymore after you guys saw him."

"Possibly," Nancy agreed, "or maybe he had a snowmobile on the other side of the river. There must be a road back there somewhere."

"But with the storm, he couldn't have come from very far," Dave insisted.

"I'd like to check anyway," Nancy said. "I wonder if the river is as frozen solid as it looks." She set one foot on the ice, but it instantly began to crack and so she quickly stepped back.

"I thought you said the figure was _on_ the river last night," Bess said. "If the ice is so thin, how is that even possible?"

"I don't know." Nancy furrowed her brow. She knew what she had seen the night before, but Bess was right; it did seem impossible.


	3. Hadley

J.M.J.

_Author's note: Thank you for continuing to read! Thank you especially for the reviews! Rose12, I'm very excited to see that you're back for this story!_

**Chapter III**

**Hadley**

Nancy stood at the edge of the frozen river, contemplating the mystery. The blizzard had only ended about two hours before she had seen the ghostly figure down by the river. Even if there was a road that he might have come in by on the other side of the river, it wouldn't have been plowed out yet. That was one of the biggest question marks as to whether the perpetrator could have even come from this side of the river. Still, the lack of footprints indicated that he must have been on the opposite side. As for the figure being on the river itself despite the thin ice, perhaps Nancy had been mistaken about that. It had been moonlight out, and moonlight could be tricky.

While she was standing there and thinking in silence, a cold wind began to blow. It sent scurries of snow across the drifts that had formed in the storm the day before and across the ice.

Bess shivered. "It's getting really cold out here. I think we'd better go back."

"We haven't even looked around," George told her. "You shouldn't always be so wimpy about things."

"Well, I think Bess has a point," Dave spoke up. "It is cold. It feels like the temperature is dropping by the minute. It could be dangerous to stay out here too much longer."

"That's true," Nancy admitted reluctantly. "Anyway, there doesn't seem to be anything to see on this side of the river. Where's the nearest bridge?"

"It's a couple of miles upriver," Ned told her. "We should make some calls and make sure the roads are plowed out before we go all the way up there, though."

Bess pulled her coat collar up over her mouth. "Couldn't we make the calls in the car?"

"We might as well," Dave agreed. "We'd have better reception up where we parked than we do down here, anyway."

Nancy nodded. "Let's go. There really isn't any point standing around out here for no reason."

Even though she said she was willing to go, Nancy hesitated before turning with her companions. It was impossible to rig up a supposed "ghost" without leaving some clue or evidence behind, and since the "ghost" had appeared after the storm, that evidence should still be here. She shook her head, and then finally turned to follow the others. Ned had waited for her, but the rest had gone on ahead.

However, Nancy hadn't gone more than three paces before she stopped and stood completely still. She was certain that she had heard someone whisper her name.

"Ned, did you hear anything?" she asked after a few more moments passed without the whisper being repeated.

"I almost thought I did," Ned replied, looking all around. "It sounded like someone saying your name."

"That's what I thought, too." Nancy looked all around, but there was no other person in sight. She stared hard at the trees on the other side of the river, and for an instant, she thought she saw a flicker of movement over there. The water was so wide here, though, that she couldn't be completely sure. "We need to get to the other side as soon as possible. I thought I saw something move over there."

Ned nodded. "It would make sense for whoever it is to use the other side of the river as their base of operations, since they would be less likely to have anyone wander over there and find them by accident. The one problem with it is that it would be harder for them to get over there."

"They've obviously got something worked out," Nancy said. "Come on. Let's go and see about getting to the other side of this river." She turned and started climbing the slight incline to where Dave's SUV was parked.

Ned came behind her, but after a few steps, he said, "There's one other thing I don't like about this, Nancy. How did whoever that was know your name?"

Nancy let out a long breath that froze and hung in the air. "I don't know, but I don't like it either."

When they reached the car, Nancy explained what the delay had been. Then she called the local highway district, whose phone number George had looked up while she had been waiting, and inquired as to whether the roads on the other side of the river had been plowed yet. She was told that they were being plowed at that moment.

"But," the woman she was speaking to went on, "there are a few people living back there who will sometimes plow the roads themselves. We get complaints from them every heavy snowfall that they have to do it themselves, even though we do the best we can. We just have to plow the roads with heavier traffic first."

Dave knew the way to a bridge across the river from his experience as a camp counselor, but once they were across the river, none of the boys were sure which roads might lead around to the old Delance homestead. It was all back roads on that side, some of which didn't even have a posted name. Because they were up in the hills, the roads also had dozens of twists and turns and if they started down one that seemed to be going the right way, it could easily turn around on itself and start leading the opposite direction.

They drove around for over an hour and a half without finding a road that led where they wanted to go. Dave warned them that his SUV was getting low on gas and that they had better head back to town before they were stranded. Though disappointed, they all agreed that that was the best plan.

They went back to the festival, where, even though it was just as cold here as it had been by the river, quite a few people were still milling around. Outdoor heaters had been set up, and Bess hurried to hover near one of them.

"This is much better," she declared, although she was still shivering.

There was a crowd of other people around the heater, so Dave was the only one who joined her while the others wandered off to look around the festival.

"Hey, Dave." A girl with two long red braids sticking out from underneath her stocking cap. "Did you get that paper written for World Lit yet?"

Dave shook his head. "To be honest, I haven't even decided what to write about yet."

The girls chuckled. "Same here. It would help if I actually understood one of the books we've read. That one with the fox was just weird. Of course, it might help if I had actually _read_ the books. I've been so bored with them that I mostly just skimmed them."

"You're not missing anything," Dave told her. "Say, this is my girlfriend, Bess. Bess, this is Hadley. If you haven't guessed, she's a classmate."

Hadley held out a gloved hand which Bess shook. "Nice to meet you. Are you going to college here?"

"No," Bess replied. "I just graduated high school in the spring, and I'm taking a gap year before going to college."

"Ah." Hadley drew the word out and nodded knowingly. "I kind of wish I had done that, but they all told me I wouldn't get any scholarships if I did. Hah! Joke's on them. I didn't get any scholarships anyway."

Bess smiled a little wanly. She wasn't sure how she was expected to respond to this. Fortunately, Hadley saved her the trouble of responding at all.

"So, do you have any idea what you're going to major in?" Hadley went on. "I thought I did when I started college. I signed up for a business management major. I was two weeks into my first business class when I decided I hated it. I've switched my major three times since then, and I'm only a sophomore. I just can't find a major that really suits me, you know? I know what I'd _like_ to major in, but I don't know of any colleges that offer it as a BA or a BS or whatever it would be."

"What's that?" Dave asked, stealing a wink at Bess. He knew that Hadley would go on talking indefinitely without any encouragement, so he might as well be polite to her.

"Well, see, I'm taking this really cool class this semester," Hadley explained. "It's technically a psych class, but it's all about paranormal activity. That's ghosts and stuff, you know. It's so cool. My professor one hundred percent unironically believes in ghosts. He's absolutely dead set that ghosts are really real. I've never met anyone who's _that_ convinced about it. Half the time, he mostly just tells these spooky stories about ghost sightings and he believes them so hard that I usually can't sleep if I think about it at all before I go to bed. I'd love to major in paranormal activity or whatever and just talk about ghosts all the time."

"Does he ever talk about Jack Delance?" Bess asked, beginning to take an interest in the conversation after all.

"Oh, sure," Hadley said. "He's really interested in that story. He's not totally convinced it's a real ghost, because even though he is absolutely convinced that ghosts are the real deal, he's smart enough to realize that not every ghost sighting is legit. Some of them really are people's imagination or someone playing a prank or something that's misidentified or some simply lying. Because we don't understand much – read, anything – about ghosts, the only way to decide if a ghost is legit is to rule all those things out and so far he hasn't been able to rule any of them out."

"How do you rule out whether it's someone's imagination or an actual ghost?" Dave asked, trying to keep a straight face. Since he didn't believe in ghosts, he found it amusing when someone else took the matter so seriously. "I mean, how can you tell if they're just imagining or if for whatever reason, they're the only one who can see or hear the ghost?"

"That's where the psychology – what little psychology there is – in this class comes in," Hadley replied. "Ordinarily, you're not going to just imagine something for no reason, especially not something vivid. Oh, sure, everyone gets the feeling that they're being watched or they think they hear spooky sounds once in a while or even that they see something out of the corner of their eye, especially right after they've watched a horror movie, but you're not going to just imagine up an entire, vivid ghost for no reason. So, the person who claims to have seen a ghost has to be evaluated for mental illness for one thing and even if they pass that, the rest of the situation has to be evaluated for other factors. You know, whether they're sleepy or stressed or already scared or just simply tired. If nothing turns up that could likely contribute to a person imagining up a ghost, then most likely they're not imagining. As you can probably guess, most ghost sightings that can't be outright disproved still can't be definitely proven."

"This is really interesting," Bess said, though her shivering was not merely from the cold now. "I'd like to learn more about it. What's your professor's name?"

"Myles Norden," Hadley replied. "He doesn't actually have a doctorate, so it's just 'Mr. Norden'. Well, really, most of us just call him Norden. He hates his first name, so nobody calls him by that. I don't think it's such a bad first name, but hey, to each their own."

Bess was about to ask another question about Professor Norden and his theories about ghosts when there was a flash of light from somewhere up above, accompanied by a pop. Bess looked up just in time to see a shower of glass raining down.


	4. The First Leads

J.M.J.

_Author's note: Thank you all so much for continuing to read this story, and for leaving reviews if you have so far. Drogorath, I'm very excited to see you in the reviews again! If you haven't left a review yet, I'd love to hear what you're thinking. I always read every review and think very seriously about any suggestions that are given to me, as my stories are always a work in progress until they're completely posted._

**Chapter IV**

**The First Leads**

Hadley let out an ear-splitting screech that was almost more terrifying than the falling glass. Dave grabbed Bess by the hand and pulled her out of the way just before the shards reached them as others scattered to get to safety. All around the festival area, the same flashes and pops were happening.

"What…What's going on?" Bess stammered.

However, the confusion only lasted a few minutes. The flashes and pops petered out and did not repeat themselves.

Hadley pointed upward. "The lights exploded!"

Bess looked up as well. Sure enough, though she hadn't noticed it because it was daylight, there was a streetlight right above the heater where she and Dave had been standing. There were more streetlights all around the festival area, and every single one of them had blown-out bulbs.

Then Bess spotted Nancy standing nearby. She hurried toward her. "Um, Nancy, could you shed any light on what just happened?"

"I'm not sure," Nancy said. "The lights were all off, so I don't see how of the bulbs could have been blown. Anyway, one bulb might blow, but certainly not every single one in this field."

Hadley had followed Bess and Dave. Now she shook her head mournfully. "I know what it is. This happened in Jefferson the other night. I went to one of my professor's office hours – his office is off in a little wing of Jefferson Hall with three other offices – and all the lights in that wing blew out just like these."

"So what is it, then?" George asked her.

Hadley looked a trifle sheepish. "Well, I guess I don't actually _know_ what it is, but the professor I was talking to, who's an expert in this kind of thing, said that he's seen that kind of thing happen in cases of paranormal activity."

George raised an unimpressed eyebrow. "You're saying the college is haunted?"

"No, my professor is, and he is a paranormal expert," Hadley said. "I don't know that I buy it, but I mean, come on, you've gotta admit that this happening even once would be a super weird and freakish accident and now twice? There's no way."

"I agree," Nancy said, "but I don't think we should just jump to the conclusion that it's a ghost."

"Yeah, I seriously doubt it's a ghost, too, but why would anyone go blowing up light bulbs on purpose, Nancy?" Burt asked.

"Maybe to make it look like a haunting," Nancy replied. She turned to Hadley. "Excuse me. My name is Nancy Drew." She held out her hand.

Hadley shook it. "Hadley Bowen. So _you're_ Nancy Drew. I've heard of you. You've solved a few mysteries around here."

"A few," Nancy admitted. "This so-called 'ghost' is interesting to me. I'd like to talk to your professor about it, since he is an expert, after all. What is his name?"

Hadley repeated what she had told Bess about Professor Norden. "So, I'm confused," she finished. "Do you or do you not think it was actually a ghost?"

"Well…" Nancy paused to consider the best way to answer the question. "I think we should eliminate every other possibility before we settle on that."

"Hmm. Fair enough," Hadley replied. Then someone else's conversation caught her attention and she went to interject her opinions into that one instead.

Nancy and her friends drew closer together in hopes of avoided any further interruptions.

"There's one thing that's bothering me about the possibility that someone is playing ghost here," Ned said. "Why would they make the light bulbs explode during the day? Wouldn't it be more effective at night?"

"Yes," Nancy replied. "Possibly, they didn't mean for their special effect to go off now. The lights shouldn't have been turned on until dusk, after all, and so that was probably when they intended for the explosion to happen. However, the rig the bulbs to blow up, they would have had to tamper with each one individually this morning, before the Festival technically began and so there wouldn't have been as many people around. They probably weren't counting on someone turning the lights on now."

"So, what's the plan for investigating this then?" Dave asked.

"I think first we'd better find out who turned the lights on," Nancy replied. "I could be wrong about it being unintentional on the 'ghost's' part, and that would mean that the person who did it is involved. On the other hand, if I'm right, they're in the clear. Either way, it's best to have as many facts as we can. Do any of you know where the switch for these lights would most likely be?"

"Yeah," Burt said. "I got suckered into being on the committee for the Festival last year. The switch is in the basement of the Administration Building, over there." He pointed, although all of them were already familiar with the layout of the college.

By this time, the committee members who were present had begun asking people to leave the area so that they could clean up the mess. Nancy and her friends, with one accord, offered to help with the clean-up, which was gratefully accepted. It would be no quick task to clean up all the larger pieces of glass (it would be impossible to clean up the small ones with the snow) and, of course, the light bulbs needed replaced before that evening.

George found herself working alongside a young man named Paul Jeong who enthusiastically explained that he was from South Korea and that he tried to volunteer for as many things as he could fit in to give himself plenty of chances to practice his English and get as much experience as he could in the United States.

"How long have you been studying in the US?" George asked. She was under the impression already that Paul spoke better English than most of her classmates in high school.

"This is my second year," Paul told her. "But I did a few years of college back home. Not all my credits transferred, so even though I've been in college for almost five years now, I'm still just a junior. I was luckier than some of my friends, though, because I studied English at home and could speak it well enough that I didn't have to take English classes here."

"So, what do you think of America?" George asked, more just to make conversation than anything else.

"I like it," Paul avowed. "It's a lot different than my own country, of course, and it will be nice to go home next summer, but I'm glad I decided to study here. I stayed in America last summer to do summer classes and to travel a little, so I'm a little homesick. You should definitely study in another country if you get the chance."

"I'll keep that in mind," George replied. "Say, do you have any idea what could have caused the lights to just explode like that? I heard someone saying that she thought it was a ghost."

Paul rolled his eyes. "Hadley. She's always talking about ghosts, and she says everything is caused by ghosts."

George grinned. "Sounds like you don't like her much."

"I just think she's very…annoying," Paul said, pausing a moment to think of the right word. "She talks all the time, but I don't believe most of what she says. I think she just wants to be the center of attention."

"Hmm." That was certainly an interesting bit of information, George thought. "But what happened with the lights was pretty weird. Do you think she could be right about the ghosts?"

Paul shook his head firmly. Then he leaned forward and whispered, "I think she caused it to happen herself so she could keep talking about ghosts."

"Are you sure about that?" George asked, dropping her own voice to a whisper.

"I can't be _sure_," Paul admitted, "but I think it's a better explanation than that there really are ghosts."

In the meantime, Nancy and Ned were standing by at the base of the ladder while another Festival Committee volunteer, Devin Sobol, stood at the top and removed the bases from the blown-out bulbs. Because the glass bulbs themselves were gone, he had to use a pliers to remove the bases, which was still not an easy task. He handed the bases to Nancy as he pried each one out, and she examined it.

"How would you rig a light bulb to explode like that?" Ned asked her.

"I think what probably was done was that the filament in the bulb was tampered with," Nancy explained. "When it gives way, air can enter the bulb. That would explain the bright flash of light right before they exploded, and also why a few of them took a few seconds longer than others to explode."

Devin had just climbed down the ladder and overheard. He shook his head. "I just don't get why anyone would try pulling something like this. If it was meant to be a prank, it wasn't very funny."

"Most pranks aren't when you're the victim," Ned pointed out.

"Touché," Devin admitted. "Well, I just hope whoever did this doesn't try for more pranks throughout the rest of the Festival. They already pretty well spoiled this afternoon. Let's hope they don't do the same tomorrow, especially at the dance tomorrow night."

"I don't want to throw suspicion around, but who would have had access to changing these light bulbs and then turning on the lights a little while ago?" Nancy asked him.

Devin looked down at the pliers in his hand. "I mean, anyone on the committee could have been checking those lights. Or any of the maintenance team. I mean, that's sort of their job. I don't see who else would have had any business looking at the lights, and it would take a lot of guts for someone who doesn't to take the time to replace every single bulb. Only people on the maintenance team or in security and one or two people on the committee could have turned the lights on, though. They're the only ones with keys to the room where the switch is."

"Well, Nancy, what do you think?" Ned asked as they wandered a little way off by themselves. "Do you think this is connected to Jack Delance?"

"It would be quite the coincidence if two completely separate people were causing trouble like this in a small town like Emerson," Nancy replied. "I don't see what the connection is, though, other than that they're both trying to make it look like there are ghosts roaming around, unless the fact that this seems kind of ghostly is coincidental."

"Don't forget what happened earlier today at the river," Ned reminded her. "We both heard someone call your name, and we couldn't have both been imagining it."

Nancy smiled. "Are you suggesting that the ghost of Jack Delance is purposely haunting me?"

"It wouldn't be the first time," Ned reminded her.

Nancy's smile faded a little bit. Her detective work had earned her more than a few enemies, and several of them had tried to exact revenge at one point or another, some of them adopting schemes even more farfetched than making it look like a ghost was haunting her.

"You know," she said, "I doubt that's what's happening here, but it would be worth looking into."

Once the clean-up was finished, the friends gathered in a secluded corner of the campus library to discuss their findings. Bess, Burt, and Dave had nothing new to report, but George told about her conversation with Hadley.

"I don't know," Dave said. "A bid for attention on Hadley's part seems pretty out there to me."

"We don't really have any better options yet," George replied. "There's no property for anyone to be scared off of and the ghost doesn't seem to be actually doing any harm."

"The light bulbs had to be the work of someone on the Festival committee or else in maintenance or security," Nancy said. "That narrows the suspect pool down a lot from the entire faculty, staff, and student body of Emerson, even if it still leaves probably twenty or so suspects. I think we should split up into three groups. One group can try to track down the Festival committee members who have keys to the basement of the Admin Building, one can find out who is on duty on the maintenance team today, and one can find out the same about security. I'm also going to email this Professor Norden. If he's interested in paranormal phenomenon, then chances are he already has done some investigating into both Jack Delance and the light bulb incident at his office."


	5. The Ghost Returns

J.M.J.

_Author's note: Thank you so much for reading this far! Thank you especially to everyone who's been leaving reviews! You guys are great!_

**Chapter V**

**The Ghost Returns**

"What do we do if they don't want to tell us who's on duty in maintenance today?" Dave asked as he and Bess walked toward the maintenance office on the other side of the campus.

Bess gave a doleful shake of her head. "I don't know. That's why I really hate doing things like this. Don't tell Nancy that."

Dave chuckled. "She obviously has confidence in us, anyhow. I guess we'd better just try the direct approach. You know, somebody turned the lights on at the wrong time and we're just trying to figure out what happened."

By this time, they had reached the door into the maintenance office. It was a small office crowded into what was basically an oversized closet. Most of the room was clogged with cleaning or building supplies. The only occupant was a teenage girl sitting in a chair that was leaned precariously against the wall while she read a book. A landline was hooked up to the wall within arm's reach.

She obviously wasn't expecting visitors, because when the door opened, she jumped and lost her balance in the chair. She flailed her arms to try to catch herself, but she only managed to knock the phone off its hook so that she fell in a jumbled heap of chair, book, and phone. Dave rushed forward to help.

"I'm sorry!" he apologized. "We didn't mean to scare you."

"Are you okay?" Bess asked.

"Uh, yeah, I think so." The girl took Dave's proffered hand and stood up with his help. She rubbed her elbow momentarily, and then she let out a pained squawk.

"What's the matter?" Bess stepped forward as if she expected the girl to collapse.

Instead of collapsing, she bent down and picked up the book she had been reading with a moan. The front cover was folded forward in an unsightly crease. "My poor book."

"We're really sorry," Dave said. "We should have knocked, I guess. We can buy you a new one, if you want."

"No," the girl said, staring down at the damaged book in her hands as if it was an injured puppy. "No, you couldn't replace this book any more than you could replace my best friend."

Bess and Dave exchanged glances that were half amused and half concerned.

"It could be worse," the girl declared suddenly. "I can still read it, and creases are to books as scars are to people. They add character, you see."

"Oh," Bess replied, unsure how else to reply.

"Um, do you guys need something?" the girl asked, suddenly remembering her job. "Are you here to report a major spill or something broken or what?"

"Actually," Dave said, "I'm not sure if anyone's reported all the light bulbs on the main lawn blowing out."

"_All_ the light bulbs?" the girl repeated. She made a sound somewhere between a snort and a chuckle. "That must have been something to see. Oh, I'll call somebody about it."

"No, you don't need to bother," Dave assured her. "The Festival committee cleaned it all up."

The girl clapped her hands over her mouth. "Oh, man," she said, without removing her hands. "Clark is going to be furious when he hears about this. He's always ragging us about not doing our job. That's why I jumped when you came in, by the way. I thought it might be him. Last time he caught me reading on duty, he almost had an aneurism, or whatever it is people have when they're super mad. It was pretty ridiculous to be honest. I mean, I'm literally only here to answer the phone. Like, what else am I supposed to do in the five hours between phone calls?"

"Who's Clark?" Bess asked.

"He's the head maintenance man. I don't remember his official title," the girl said. "So, if you don't need help with the light bulbs, what do you need?"

"Actually, we're trying to figure out what happened with them," Bess told her. She looked over at Dave and then back to the girl and made a snap decision. "My name's Bess and this is Dave. We're friends with Nancy Drew…"

"Really?" the girl cut her off. "I've always wanted to meet her! Does she think some sort of crook blew out the lights? Like, someone's sabotaging the Winter Festival? That would make this year's festival so much cooler than last year's. Can I help? My name's Mandy, by the way. Mandy Gillespie."

"Yeah, you could help," Bess said. "Someone had to have turned the lights on to make them blow out like that. We're trying to narrow down who could have."

"Oh, right, because all the switches to the outdoor lights are in the basement of the Admin Building." Mandy stopped to think. "Well, I can't speak for anybody outside the maintenance team, but only the people on duty have keys on them. Clark is a real stickler for that, because if anything gets stolen or tampered with or anything, the maintenance team is always an easy scapegoat. So everyone has to check their keys and out at the beginning and end of their shift. Clark is the only one who takes any keys home with him, and that's just the keys to the outside of this building and this office so he can open in the morning and lock up at night."

"Who's on duty right now?" Dave asked.

Mandy pointed out a duty roster on the wall behind them. "Just Kat and Julio. But I know they couldn't have turned the lights on because they've been working in the dorms all during their shift. That's all the way across campus, so even if one of them is shady, it would be tough for them to sneak out long enough to get all the way over to the Admin Building."

Dave studied the roster. "It looks like they've been working all day. I take it, then, that neither of them was scheduled to replace those light bulbs?"

"Nope." Mandy brushed her bangs out of her eyes. "So, basically, unless it was Clark, it couldn't have been anyone in maintenance, and I really don't think it was Clark. He's not the nicest boss in the world, but I'd bet anything he's not crooked."

Bess took a moment to think if there were any other questions they should ask. "Has anyone lost their keys recently?"

"Huh-uh," Mandy said. "Everyone's super careful with their keys since Clark will literally kill them if they lose them. Okay, maybe not _literally_, but there is a little part of me who thinks maybe literally."

Bess chuckled in confusion, which wasn't the first time in this conversation that she had felt this way. "Thanks, Mandy. You've been a big help. Sorry again about your book."

"Aw, it's okay," Mandy assured her. "Most of my books have a few creases. It's just that this one is brand new and the first crease is kind of like the first scratch on a new car. You know it's bound to happen, but you want to put it off as long as you can."

NDNDNDNDND

George and Burt had uncovered the names of the two committee members who had keys: Joanna Dutton and Eliot Beckman. However, since Burt didn't know either of them, they hadn't gotten a chance to talk to them.

Nancy and Ned had had even worse luck. There was no chatty student worker in Security, and the officer whom they spoke to refused to give out any information about employees, saying instead that Security would look into the matter.

"It does narrow the suspects down even more," Bess said. She was feeling particularly accomplished and optimistic at being a part of the team that had uncovered the most information. "Now we've just got Joanna, Eliot, and the Security staff who could have turned the lights on, and it basically had to be someone on the Festival committee who replaced the light bulbs."

There were no more leads to follow at the moment, so the group of friends returned to the Festival. Most of the conversations happening there seemed to revolve around the light bulb incident, much to the discomfiture of the committee members within earshot.

Later that evening, the girls returned to their hotel. Bess and George were tired and ready for to sleep, but Nancy was still wide awake as she turned the mystery over in her head.

"It just doesn't make sense," she said finally. "Someone is trying to make it look like a ghost is at work. That much is clear. What I don't understand is why. I don't see how anyone could possibly have anything to gain by this."

"Besides trying to scare people off their property, what other motives have you run into for fake haunting in your cases, Nancy?" George asked. "Revenge, sometimes, but I don't see how any one particular person could be the target of this."

"In a few cases, someone was using a 'ghost' to force a confession out of someone," Nancy replied, "but again, that only works if someone in particular is the target."

"Are you sure you're not the target?" Bess asked abruptly. "I mean, the 'ghost' knows your name and was calling to you down by the river, which is just creepy. But it does mean that you're the only person we know whom the 'ghost' has taken any particular interest in."

"That's true," Nancy agreed, nodding slowly, "but these sightings have been happening for several weeks now. It seems like it would be a lot of work for possibly no returns. Still, it wouldn't be the first time someone has gone to great lengths to try to get revenge for being captured."

She walked over to the window, still considering the possibility, and pulled the blinds open a little. It was a cold and clear night and the moonlight on the snow cast an eerie light, much like it had been the night before. The window looked toward the river, and there, Nancy spotted the same bluish glow that she had seen from the restaurant parking lot. The hotel was a little farther away, and so it looked like a glowing blob rather than a human figure, but Nancy knew it had to be the same thing.

"The 'ghost' is out there again!" She stepped away from the window and ran to put on her boots and coat again.

Bess and George were wide awake and ready to follow her lead immediately. They bundled themselves up and ran down to the parking lot, where their intention was to jump into Nancy's car and drive down to the spot where they had parked earlier that day to reach the river. Nancy pressed the unlock button on her key fob as soon as she was out of the building. Bess had jumped into the back seat of the car and George was stepping through the front passenger door when Nancy stopped with a look of dismay on her face.

"What's wrong?" George asked.

Nancy pointed. "The tires are all slashed."


	6. Professor Norden

J.M.J.

_Author's note: Thanks for continuing to read! In particular, thank you to everyone who has been reviewing! It means a lot to me to see what you all think. I'm glad you're liking it so far!_

**Chapter VI**

**Professor Norden**

George slammed her hand against the door of the car in frustration. "Oh, brother. Of all the dumb things that could have happened."

Bess had climbed out of the car as well and bent over one of the tires. "They're cut with a knife or something. The 'ghost' must have done it. This prove that he's after you, Nancy."

Nancy was also looking at the ruined tires with her arms folded. Then she looked up toward the river where the bluish light had already vanished. "Maybe, but it seems to me that they're more interested in keeping me away from that so-called ghost than trying to lure me into any kind of danger."

"Well, I guess we're not going to catch that 'ghost' tonight," George grumbled.

Reluctantly, the girls went back to their room.

NDNDNDNDND

"Brr!" Bess shivered as she crawled out of bed the next morning. "It feels like a refrigerator in here. Don't tell me the ghost took out our heater now, too."

"I don't think so," George replied as she looked at the weather app on her phone. "The temperatures have just dropped a lot. The Festival's going to be a little frigid today."

"That's why you shouldn't have things outside during the winter," Bess grumbled.

Because Nancy's car was still out of commission, they called the boys to come and pick them up. At the same time, Nancy made arrangements for a tow truck to come for her car, cringing a little at the expense of having it done on a weekend.

"So, what's first on the list?" Burt asked when the boys arrived. "The festival or is there some more sleuthing you want to do, Nancy?"

"Actually, a little bit of both," Nancy replied. "I think the best lead we have right now are the two committee members who have keys, Joanna and Eliot, and the most likely place to find them is the Festival."

When they arrived at the college, they found that the Festival was being moved indoors as much as possible because of the weather. The entire committee was present, hard at work moving tables and decorations. Hadley spotted Nancy and her friends and waved to them.

"This stupid weather," she grumbled when they came closer. "I've thought from the beginning that a winter festival was a bad idea. Even when it's not below zero temperatures, it's too cold to just be hanging around outside. The only interesting thing is the ice sculptures anyway, and people can walk around and look at them without dragging me into the cold."

"If you think the Festival is such a bad idea, why did you volunteer for the committee?" Dave asked.

"I'm running for student government," Hadley explained. "I figured it would look good. If I get elected, I'm going to push to switch out the Winter Festival for a Spring Festival or even a Fall Festival would be better. At least you wouldn't be guaranteed of freezing to death with those."

"Can we help?" Nancy offered.

"Oh, hallelujah," Hadley replied. "Yes. Absolutely, yes. I will even ask the committee to consider awarding all of you medals for heroic volunteer work."

"That's not necessary, but thanks anyway," Nancy told her with a grin.

While they were helping carry things indoors, Nancy was able to have Hadley point out Joanna Dutton and Eliot Beckman. She also explained that they were the committee chairpersons and were very enthusiastic about the Festival. That bit of news discouraged Nancy only slightly. Even though someone who was enthusiastic about the Festival wouldn't be likely to sabotage it, their enthusiasm could be an act if they had something else planned. Additionally, the person who turned on the lights wasn't necessarily behind the "ghost", as that might have been an accident, but it was possible that they had seen something, and so Nancy wanted to talk to them anyway.

The set up was nearly finished when Hadley pointed out a man with red hair that was now flecked with gray who was talking to Eliot Beckman. "That's Professor Norden," she explained.

"It is?" Nancy quickly took note of him. "I want to talk to him. I emailed him yesterday, but he hasn't replied."

"Yeah, no surprise there," Hadley replied. "He's the sort of professor who doesn't answer emails for about three weeks. If you're only going to be here for the weekend, you'd better go talk to him now. No guarantee he's going to stick around much longer for the Festival. I know I wouldn't if I could possibly help it."

Nancy nodded and hurried toward Norden and Eliot. Eliot was tall and almost painfully skinny with lank blond hair that went to below his ears. At the moment, his jaw was clenched and his brows furrowed. Clearly, the conversation between him and Norden was not a friendly one. Nancy slowed down as her detective instincts told her to listen.

"You can't ask me to keep this quiet much longer," Eliot was saying. He seemed to be trying to keep his voice low but was too wound-up to be successful. "It isn't right, and you know it."

"You don't know what you're talking about," Norden retorted. "It's not hurting anyone, but putting it out there for everyone to hear at this stage could do all kinds of damage."

Eliot shook his head. "I should have known from the beginning that you were a fraud." Then he noticed Nancy and without another word, turned on his heel and marched away.

Although Nancy wanted to talk to Eliot, and now more so than ever, she reasoned that she would be able to find him around the Festival later, whereas she wouldn't know where to look for Professor Norden if he left. She approached him and smiled, doing her best not to show that she had overheard the last part of the argument.

It seemed to take Professor Norden a moment to readjust from the argument and smile back at her. "Hello. Do I know you?"

"No," Nancy said, holding out her hand. "I'm Nancy Drew. I'm interested in the legend surrounding the ghost of Jack Delance. I heard that you've made a special study of paranormal activity, and I was hoping to get a chance to talk to you about it."

"Oh, of course," Norden replied. He seemed slightly taken aback, but he smoothed it over quickly. "As a matter of fact, I don't have much information on that story. I've lived in Emerson quite a few years, and there haven't been any sightings until recently, so it's only in the last few weeks that I've really begun to study it in earnest."

"Do you think that the sightings are real?" Nancy asked.

Norden took a deep breath. "I understand that many people have a hard time accepting this, but I'm a scientist. I don't make snap decisions on things like this. I might never be able to answer that question definitively. I'll have to research this further."

"How do you research something like this?" Nancy asked. "I mean, you can't make the ghost appear on command, so what do you do?"

"I'm a psychologist, primarily," Norden explained. "Most of my studies have been examining the psychology of people who have claimed to see ghosts. I've also done some research into determining whether a sighting that could not have been pure imagination might be a hoax or have some other natural explanation, as both possibilities must be eliminated before paranormal activity can be settled on the cause of whatever was observed. My hypothesis is that many ghost sightings are, indeed, real, and so I am in an ongoing process of testing that hypothesis. That's part of why I haven't done much research into Jack Delance, since I have several other incidents I'm working on."

Nancy nodded slowly, but Norden's story seemed strange to her. She understood from her own detective work that he wanted to follow through his other investigations to the end. However, if he was as passionate about this as he sounded, surely he would have jumped at the chance to research in his own backyard. Then, too, there was the argument with Eliot. She couldn't help feeling that that had to have something to do with Norden's apparent reluctance to research Jack. Then, too, she recalled Hadley telling her that Norden didn't have a doctorate. That didn't necessarily disprove his story, but it was another puzzling aspect of it for someone who seemed so passionate about a particular science.

"Has anyone done much research about Jack Delance?" Nancy asked. "The local ghost must have some kind of following."

Norden chuckled. "Mostly as a campfire story. I suppose a few people have probably collected the accounts as a sort of local history. Otherwise, no, there really hasn't been any academic interest in this particular story at all. You have to understand that when the most recent sighting was over seventy years ago, I couldn't do any research according to my usual methods, and I don't have the time to devote to a study that would be purely hobby. Now that there have been sightings again, things are different, of course, but I still have to find the time to actually make the study. It all has to be on my own time and my own money, since the college isn't interested in funding a study on ghosts just yet. We can always hope for the future, though." He nervously twisted a ring on his right forefinger. It looked to Nancy as if it was a plain silver band, but she couldn't tell much else about it except that it was the only ring he was wearing. "Well, it's been very nice talking to you…Nancy, is it? I have to go now, though. If you have any more questions, you can email me."

He practically ran away, giving Nancy no opportunity to follow him or continue the conversation. At once, her friends hurried to her side to ask her what she had learned. They had seen her talking to Norden, but they had kept their distance so that they wouldn't interrupt her.

"Well?" Bess asked. "Did you find out anything?"

"Not exactly," Nancy said. She whispered a brief account of the argument. "It could be unrelated, of course, but there are some common denominators in all three cases. If they are all connected, I'm starting to think there's something serious going on."


	7. A Friendly Competition

J.M.J.

_Author's note: Thank you for continuing to read! It really means a lot to me to know that you actually choose to spend some of your free time reading this story, so thank you again. I'm especially always grateful for reviews, since they let me know what you're actually thinking about this story. I had a lot of fun writing this chapter. It was fun getting to put Burt and Dave in the spotlight for a change and seeing them all having fun. I can promise you, though, that things are going to start getting a whole lot spookier…_

**Chapter VII**

**A Friendly Competition**

Despite the last minute change of plans putting the Festival indoors, people began arriving for it in force. Though Nancy tried to talk to both Joanna and Eliot, they brushed her off in favor of their obligations toward the Festival. However, it wasn't long before Nancy and her friends began enjoying themselves. The committee had brought in several games and music and the crowd was in a good mood.

One of the games was a beanbag toss that Paul Jeong was running. A few younger kids were playing it, but Paul seemed pretty bored.

Burt winked at Dave and Ned. "I challenge you two to a contest of feats of strength of arm."

Dave raised an eyebrow. "Seriously, Burt? It's a kid's game."

"You're not afraid, are you?" Burt countered. He took off one of his gloves and threw it on the ground. "There. I've thrown down the gauntlet. You can't honorably refuse now."

"Uh, Burt, people are watching," Bess said through gritted teeth when she noticed that Burt's antics were attracting a crowd.

"All the better," Burt replied with a grin. "Surely you don't want the whole school to know that you wouldn't take me up on my challenge to a beanbag toss, Dave."

"Oh, come on, Dave," Ned encouraged him. "We can take him."

"Fine." Dave gave in with a shake of his head.

Each of the three boys gave Paul a quarter, as the games were part of a fundraiser and had a small admission fee. Paul grinned at the thought of seeing the three boys compete in the simple game. After all, Ned and Burt was on the football team, and Dave had gained renown for himself in intramural baseball games. He handed each boy three beanbags and explained the simple rules. A board had been set up with three holes of different sizes. They were each worth different amounts of points, with the largest hole being worth the least. Anyone who could get all three beanbags through a hold won a small prize, with the option of better prizes the more points they won.

Dave stepped up to go first. "Might as well get this over with."

"Hold on," Burt protested. "We all know about your pitching arm, Dave. You've got to stand farther back than that." He backed up until he was about ten yards from the target. "I think here would be just about right."

Dave reluctantly went to stand next to him with the painful awareness that more and more people were beginning to watch. "Throwing a beanbag is nothing like throwing a baseball, you know. It's going to be a trick to even throw it far enough to hit the board, let alone get it through one of the holes."

"You can always default the contest to me," Burt replied with a shrug.

"No way," Dave said, "but you're standing just as far back as I am when it's your turn."

"Fair enough," Burt agreed.

Then he backed off, and Dave prepared to make his throw. The first beanbag fell short of the target.

"Come on, Dave," Bess encouraged him. "You can still beat him on points."

Dave flashed her a smile and made his second throw. This time, it hit the board a couple of inches away from the smallest hole. With a determined set to his jaw, Dave squared himself up and then threw the third one. It sailed right through the smallest hole. Bess began to clap, and the rest of the crowd joined in.

Dave's face reddened, but he tried to hold onto his dignity. "You're up next, Burt. Let's see if you can do any better."

Burt shook his head. "Ned and I are doing this the fair way. We're drawing straws. Short straw goes first."

"What are you using for straws?" George asked.

"Toothpicks." Burt held two up that he had evidently picked up from one of the snack tables. Then he broke one in half and held them up so that no one could tell which was the broken one. "Go on, Ned. Draw."

Ned peered at the toothpicks and took his time choosing one. Finally, he picked one. He pulled it out with a groan. It was the short one.

"It's not like it really makes any difference," Nancy reminded him.

"I know," Ned replied with a good-natured grin. Then he stepped up to the spot where Burt had chosen for them to stand. "Is this good?" he asked.

"Looks about right," Burt agreed.

Then Ned made his three throws in a much more rapid-fire rate than Dave had. The first went through the medium-sized hole, but the second caught on the side of the hole and didn't go through. The third hit the board squarely and with enough force that it knocked the board over. Paul scrambled to pick it back up.

"Sorry about that," Ned told him.

"No worries," Paul replied with a grin. "There's no points taken off for that, but Dave's still in the lead so far."

Then Burt stepped up to take his turn. He was just gearing up to throw when Dave stopped him.

"Hold it, hold it, hold it," he said. "You're much closer to the target than I was. You need to back up at least another foot and a half."

"_Maybe_ the half," Burt conceded, taking a tiny step backward.

Then he launched his first beanbag. It went through the smallest hole effortlessly. The second one followed it quickly and then the third sailed after it. The crowd erupted into cheers, and even Dave clapped, although he pretended to do it begrudgingly.

"Perfect score!" Paul announced. "You can pick your prize from the top tier, Burt."

The prizes were all cheap toys that could be ordered in bulk from magazines. The top tier, though, was made up of beanbag animals. Burt picked out a panda bear, which he then presented to George with a flourish.

"A gift for you, m'lady," he said as he bowed.

"Oh, why, thank you," George replied, acting as if she had to act more pleased than she really was. She took the panda and looked at its face, noticing that one eye was sewn on higher than the other. "I'll cherish always."

"What's up, Burt?" Dave asked. "Have you been taking secret beanbag throwing lessons or something?"

"I guess I should have warned you," Burt replied with a grin. "You're looking at the reigning beanbag toss champion of four Eddleton family reunions in a row."

Nancy chuckled along with the others and shook her head. The crowd was starting to disperse now that it looked as if the fun was over, which was a relief to Nancy who didn't like to be the center of attention when she could help it. She noticed Liam, Ned's fraternity brother who had opened the door for the girls the night they arrived, amidst the crowd, and she realized with a little shiver that he had been staring straight at her. As soon as she looked up, though, he averted his gaze and moved off with the crowd so that Nancy lost sight of him.

There was nothing unusual about Liam being at the Festival, Nancy told herself, and everyone had been watching her friends, so Liam's attention probably didn't mean anything. Even so, she had always felt that he was possibly not to be trusted.

It was midmorning by this time, and Nancy's group went to one of the snack tables to find some food and coffee. Nancy began to follow them, but then her phone rang and she stopped to answer it. The number was one that she didn't recognize.

"Hello?" There was no answer at first, but there was a sound of some kind. Nancy listened carefully and decided it sounded like someone breathing. "Hello? Is someone there?"

"Nancy," a voice whispered. It was the same voice that had whispered her name at the river.

Nancy tightened her grip on the phone. "Who is this?"

"Meet me in the basement," the voice replied hollowly, followed by a click as the call was disconnected.

Nancy took her phone from her ear and looked around. Her friends had disappeared into the crowd by now, and it could take some time to find them, and she didn't want to miss the chance to find a clue concerning the ghost. She quickly tapped out a text which she forwarded to all five of her friends in hopes that one of them would see it in the next few minutes. Then she shoved her phone into her pocket and darted away toward the basement.

She knew from past visits to the college that the elevator didn't go to the basement. The only way to reach it was by the stairs, and since there were no classroom or anything else that the general public had any business in down there, the door was usually locked. Nancy had a feeling that this time, though, she would find the door open. She turned the knob, and sure enough, it wasn't locked.

She glanced over her shoulder to see if anyone was watching her, but no one was in sight. Whoever she was supposed to meet must have already been in the basement. Nancy fumbled inside the doorway for a light switch, but she couldn't find one. Instead, she turned on the flashlight on her phone and started down the stairs, letting the door swing closed behind her.

There was no door at the bottom of the steps, which led into a hallway much like the ones upstairs, but much more eerie without lights.

"Hello? Is anyone there?" she called, unsure where she was supposed to go now.

"Nancy," came the reply. Again, it had all the resonance of a whispered word, but Nancy could hear it clearly.

She shivered, but she continued on with determination. The voice repeated her name several times, each time leading her farther and farther into the basement, and all the time, Nancy still didn't see anyone. She had an uneasy feeling and thought about turning back.

Then she shook her head. That was ridiculous. There were no ghosts in this basement. It was simply a plain, white corridor with doors on either side every few yards and no lights. Upstairs, it was broad daylight. Yet, that thought only added to the unnatural atmosphere. The voice whispered again, and Nancy shivered again.

She tried each door as she went past, but they were all locked, and the voice was always coming from in front of her. Finally, at the last door in the corridor, she heard the voice come from within the room it led into. Nancy turned the knob, instinctively doing it slowly and silently. It turned, and the door swung open.

Instantly, icy air flowed out toward her out of the pitch-dark room and she heard a low humming sound. She stepped inside, trying to prop the door open as she did, but she had nothing to use for that purpose, so she let it swing closed behind her. She had only taken two steps into the room when she heard a soft click behind her. She whirled around and grabbed the doorknob. It didn't turn. She was locked in and the dark and the cold were closing in around her.


	8. Two Warnings and a Black Out

J.M.J.

_Author's note: I'm so glad you're sticking around for this story! Thank you so much! Thank you especially if you've left a review for a previous chapter or will leave one for this chapter. It's good to know what you're thinking about it, and if you have suggestions, I'd love to hear them!_

**Chapter VIII**

**Two Warnings and a Black Out**

"It's locked." Nancy groaned as she jiggled the doorknob one last time without results. She could feel panic rising up in her. She was trapped, alone, in the dark, and the air around her was frigid. Someone had lured her into a trap and now they had her at their mercy.

Her phone pinged with a notification, and that completely normal, everyday sound seemed to dispel the spirits that had seemed to be in the room with her. She looked at the screen and realized that somehow the flashlight had turned off. Most likely, she had bumped the touchscreen herself, and so now she turned the light back on. She shone it around her and saw that she appeared to be in a server room. That explained the buzzing noise she had noticed when she first entered, as well as the frigid air. The electronics in a server room generated heat, but they needed to be kept cool, and to compensate, the air conditioner was usually turned up high in such rooms.

Then she looked down at her phone to see what the notification was. She was hoping it was a reply text from one of her friends, saying that they were on their way. It was a text, all right, but not from her friends. The number was the same as the number for the call that had lured her into the basement. It read:

"_This is a warning, Nancy."_

Nancy felt a shiver run down her spine, but it was a thrill of excitement and relief rather than fear. This whole thing was only meant as an attempt to scare her off the case, which meant she was starting to make somebody nervous. It also meant that the person didn't intend to do anything more at the moment and so she had only to find a way out of this room. The fastest way, of course, would be to simply call for help.

NDNDNDNDND

Several minutes earlier, Ned had noticed that Nancy wasn't with the group anymore. He tried to spot her in the crowd, but she wasn't there. He pulled his phone out of his pocket and checked his messages. There was a text, but because of the noise of the crowd, he hadn't heard the notification for it. It came as no surprise when he saw that it was from Nancy, nor was he particularly surprised to see that she had disappeared to do some detective work. Ned gathered up the others and told them where Nancy had gone.

"Let's go!" George said, eager to have a hand in meeting the "ghost".

"Shouldn't we get Security or someone like that?" Bess asked.

"Yeah, that would be best," Ned agreed. "Bess, why don't you and Dave see if you can round some security officers up, and the rest of us will start after Nancy."

The others agreed to the plan, and they split up. Ned and Burt were familiar with the building, and they walked right to the door to the basement. It was closed, and when Ned tried to open it, he found that it was locked.

"Where else would Nancy have gone?" Burt asked. "I mean, she wouldn't have locked the door behind her, so she must not have gone downstairs after all."

"Unless someone locked her down there." Ned shook the door one more time as if that would open it. "Her text just said that she got a tip to look in the basement. Maybe it was a trap."

"If she was trapped in there, she would probably be pounding on the door to try to get someone to let her out," George observed. "What if she didn't just get locked in? What if…?"

George's dire speculations were cut short when Ned's phone began to ring. He snatched it out of his pocket, saw right away that it was Nancy, and answered it by saying, "Nancy! Where are you?"

"In the basement," Nancy told him. "I'm locked in a server room, I think. It's one of the last doors at the end of the hallway. You'll probably have to get a security guard to open it."

"The door at the top of the stairs is locked, too," Ned replied. "Bess and Dave went to find a guard. They should be here any minute. What happened?"

Nancy began to explain, but before she could get very far, Bess, Dave, and a woman in a guard's uniform came trotting down the hallway.

"What's going on here?" the security officer asked when she saw George, Burt, and Ned standing at the locked door, Ned with his hand on the knob.

"Security is here," Ned told Nancy over the phone. "We'll have you out in a minute." Then he pressed the "end call" button and turned to the guard, whose nametag identified her as Becca Thomas, and explained, "Someone lured my girlfriend into the basement and then locked her in. The door here at the top is locked, and then she also says she's locked in a server room down there."

Becca rolled her eyes as she took her keys out of her pocket. "You know, I'm getting really tired of all these pranks. You're not in high school anymore. You're adults. You could cause us a whole lot of trouble messing around in the basement and in the server room. I'm going to write you all up this time. You can talk to Student Affairs about it."

"Excuse me?" Dave replied. "Our friend got locked in the basement and you're trying to blame us for it?"

Becca opened the door and gestured for the others to go through ahead of her. "It's obviously tied in with all the pranks that have been going on. It's been a major headache for everyone in Security for weeks. If this could help put a stop to it, then I'm more than willing to make an example of you."

George put her hands on her hips. "We don't know anything about any pranks, unless you're talking about what happened yesterday at the Festival. All we know is that someone called Nancy and told her to meet them in the basement, and instead of meeting, they just locked her in."

"Well, your friend should know better than to meet strangers alone in a basement," Becca replied. "Doing things like that, she can be grateful that the worst that happened was getting locked in."

"I don't think you quite understand," Bess said. "Nancy's a detective. She's trying to find out about what happened yesterday with the lights and then what's going on with the ghost out in the woods."

Becca passed her hand over her face. "That's all we need. An amateur ghost-hunter running around and stirring up trouble in addition to the pranksters. We have enough trouble with the professional ghost-hunters."

"Professionals?" George repeated. "What professional ghost hunters?"

"Oh, that Professor Norman or Norton or whatever his name is," Becca said. "I've caught him sneaking around after dark several times. He denies that he's looking for ghosts, but when that's what he supposedly studies is, what else could it be?"

"That's interesting," George murmured, recalling what Nancy had said about Professor Norden supposedly not having looked into Jack Delance's ghost.

By this time, they reached the server room, and Becca unlocked the door. Nancy came out shivering.

"Thanks," she told Becca and her friends. "I'm glad I didn't have to stay in there too long. It's like a walk-in freezer."

"I hope you've learned your lesson then." Becca closed the door to the server room and locked it again. "Now I want all your names and student ID numbers so I can report you to Student Affairs."

"We're not all students here," Bess pointed out.

"Even better. I'll just report the ones who aren't students to the police for trespassing."

"Hold on," Nancy broke in, quickly assessing the situation. "My friends didn't do anything, except get help. As for me, I think I'd rather talk to your supervisor and see what he or she makes of the situation."

"I don't know," Becca replied. "He's already busy enough with all the trouble we've been having. There's no need for all of you to descend on him now, too."

Nancy, however, was insistent, and Becca finally gave in. She led the entire group to the Security office, and Nancy explained the situation thoroughly to both Becca and her supervisor, a man named Jake Farley.

"I think a warning is sufficient for a first offence," Jake said with a pointed look toward Becca. Then he turned back to Nancy and her friends. "We do need you to keep out of areas that are generally kept locked. I also can't stress enough that meeting with strangers in a secluded area is not a wise idea. Besides that, there's never actually been any reports of ghosts on campus. You'll probably have better luck with your ghost hunting if you restrict it to places where ghost sightings have actually been reported."

As the friends left the office, George shook her head. "Those two certainly did everything they could to try to make us feel like idiots."

"Try not to worry about it," Nancy advised her. "The main thing is that they agreed to let us off with a warning. There's still the possibility that someone in Security is mixed up in this, anyway. At any rate, we've got a good clue now. Whoever called me wasn't too careful. Their phone number showed up on caller ID. Could you call it, George? If they were careless enough, we might be able to learn something that way, but they know my number, so they'll be on guard if I call them."

"Okay," George agreed. "What's the number?"

Nancy gave it to her, and George dialed it on her phone. Instead of ringing, an automated voice informed her, "The number you have dialed has been disconnected."

"That's weird," Bess said when George reported that discovery to the others. "How could have they gotten the number disconnected that fast?"

"It wouldn't be too much of a trick if they're using Caller ID spoofing software," George told her. "That's how a lot of phone scammers work. They'll make it look like the call is coming from a number with your area code so you're more likely to answer it and not be expecting it to be a scammer. They probably just picked some random number to use."

"It sounds pretty high tech for a ghost to me," Burt observed.

"True," Nancy agreed. "I think we'd better head back to the Festival. Most of our suspects were there, anyway, and I'd like to see what they're up to now and what they'll say when they see me again."

The first person they met when they returned to the Festival was Hadley. She was just walking out the door and practically ran into them.

"Oh, hi, again," she greeted them with a grin. "Coming back? Huh. I was trying to leave, because even though I'm on the committee, this is an even more boring Festival than usual. At this point, even homework sounds better than sticking around here."

"It's not that bad," Dave replied. "It's better than standing around outside in the freezing cold."

"But not as good as snuggling up with a blanket, hot cocoa, and a good movie," Hadley insisted.

"Or hunting for ghosts?" Nancy asked.

Hadley blinked. "Why? Have you seen any? If you did, that's seriously not fair."

"We haven't seen any, but I might have heard from one," Nancy replied.

They stepped back from the doorway, and Nancy explained about the phone call, although she didn't tell Hadley about being locked in the basement. Hadley didn't seem like the sort who could keep a secret very well, and so there wasn't any point in having more of the story spread around campus than necessary.

"Of course, ghosts can use the phone," Hadley said, "and of course they can make it look like any number they want is where the call is coming from. They wouldn't just use some random number, though. They'd pick one with some significance. Here, let me check something out quick." She bounded away, gesturing for the others to follow her as she went.

"Do you think we should?" Burt asked.

"We might as well," Nancy replied. "We might learn something."

Hadley led them to the computer lab and sat down at the computer at the front desk. "I work here," she explained. "We have the local phone directories from years back saved in this computer. Supposedly, it might come in handy sometime. I guess it does now, but I never really expected it to before this." She typed the phone number into a search bar and waited a moment for the search results to load. "Hmm. That's funny. It says this number belonged to a Claire Norden at one time."

"Like as in a relative of Professor Norden?" George asked.

"Yeah, maybe. It's not the super most common spelling of the name, so it's a little coincidental. Here, let me see if they've got an address here." Hadley clicked on the name, but almost at the exact moment she did, the lights went off and all the computer screens went black.


	9. Strange Behavior

J.M.J.

_Author's note: Thanks for continuing to read! Thank you especially to everyone who has left or will leave reviews! It means a lot to me!_

**Chapter IX**

**Strange Behavior**

Hadley screamed when the lights went out, but even though the others jumped, they kept calm. Ned stepped over to the light switch and toggled it back and forth, but it was dead. Nancy and George snapped on the flashlights on their phones.

"The WiFi's gone," George noted. "It must be a campus-wide power outage. I'm starting to think this is the Case of the Cursed Festival."

Hadley shook her head mournfully in the dim glow of the flashlights. "That's nothing to joke about. Someone has angered the spirits, and now they're coming for revenge."

"Oh, come on," Burt protested. "What kind of petty 'spirits' wreck a Festival just for revenge? You don't honestly believe that's what's going on here, do you?"

"Yes. As a matter of fact, I do." Hadley folded her arms and looked Burt in the eye. "I've seen enough to realize that ghosts are real, and they do interact with living humans, sometimes for good and sometimes for ill."

"Okay," Burt said, "maybe you do honestly believe that. But don't you think you should still be careful not to let ghosts become a crutch whenever there's something you don't understand? All of us have seen enough to know that a lot of things happen that have completely natural explanations even though they might not look like it at first. If you want to prove that it's not unreasonable to believe in ghosts, you need to not be unreasonable about yourself."

Hadley sat up very straight and prim. "I still believe that ghosts are behind this apparent string of bad luck. What other possible cause would anyone have for doing this?"

"We don't know," Nancy admitted. "We can't figure that out. You say that you think it's 'ghosts'. What other ghosts are there, besides Jack?"

"Well, I don't know specifically," Hadley said. "There aren't supposed to be any ghosts on this campus, but a ghost's always got to put in a first appearance sometime. I don't know that Jack's involved. He's been appearing lately, so it seems likely that he is, but I don't know what he wants if he is ruining the Festival. Maybe he just hates winter after the whole drowning-in-a-frozen-river thing. Can't really blame him there. I hate winter, and I don't even have half so good a reason." She paused. "Say, Nancy, the ghost called your phone. What was that about?"

Nancy's cheeks colored just the slightest bit at the reminder of her blunder. "The ghost, whether it's an actual ghost or a living person, seems to have taken an interest in me for some reason. It was a male voice, though, and the directory said that the phone number belonged to a woman named Claire Norden. It's obvious that it wasn't her ghost who was calling me, and I don't see why Jack would have been using her phone number."

"I think we'd better talk to Professor Norden again, though," George said. "He should be able to tell us who this Claire is and whether she's still alive. If she is, we can definitely rule her out of the ghost candidates."

Hadley stood up. "You guys can do whatever you want. All I know is that I need to get out of this place for a while. I wish there was some way I could get out of that dance tonight. I really don't want anything more to do with this Festival."

As she hurried away, Dave glanced at Nancy and asked in a low voice, "Do you think we should follow her? It's possible she's up to something. How else would she know where to look to find who that number belonged to?"

"That's a good point," Nancy agreed. "You and Bess follow. George, why don't you and Burt see if you can do some research on Claire Norden? Maybe check the archives for local papers, especially the school paper if she worked here at one point. Then Ned and I can see if we can track down Professor Norden and see what he knows about her."

"Sounds like a plan to me," George agreed. "I've got unlimited data on my phone, so no WiFi isn't an issue there."

The friends parted ways. Nancy and Ned's first stop was back at the Festival. There was some mild confusion there over the sudden loss of lights and heat, and people were beginning to leave. Professor Norden was nowhere in sight, but Nancy did spot Eliot Beckman speaking to Liam Rodgers. She decided to take the opportunity to talk to them.

"Hi, Nancy," Liam greeted her as she and Ned approached them. "I'm disappointed. I've hardly seen anything of you this entire weekend."

"Sorry," Nancy said, although she secretly was thinking about how seeing Liam was not high on her list of things she wanted to do that weekend. She turned to Eliot with a smile. "Hi, I'm Nancy Drew, and this is my boyfriend, Ned Nickerson."

"Eliot Beckman." Eliot shook both their hands. "Say, you're one of those guys with that beanbag competition. That was one of the few high points of this disaster-filled Festival."

"You're on the committee, aren't you?" Nancy said. "It's just been one thing after another, hasn't it? Some people are blaming the ghost of Jack Delance for it."

A shadow passed over Eliot's face. "I'm completely positive that Jack Delance has nothing to do with this, and I'm about ninety-nine percent certain that our problems, numerous as they are, are not supernatural."

Liam wrinkled his forehead. "But I thought you were into all this ghost stuff, Eliot. You're always talking about all the stuff that Professor Norden is telling you about ghosts."

"Yeah, and that's how I can be sure that there's no paranormal anything going on here," Eliot insisted.

"You're one of Professor Norden's students?" Nancy asked. "I was talking to him earlier. He's a very interesting man. As a matter of fact, there are a couple more things I'd like to ask him."

"Because you're working the case, too, eh, Detective Drew?" Liam grinned.

"Wait." Eliot pointed a finger at Nancy. "That's why you look so familiar. You're that girl who's solved a couple of mysteries around here. I'm sure Norden would be more than happy to talk to you about this. He's in his office now if you want to go see him."

"Thanks," Nancy said.

There weren't many excuses for prolonging the conversation that would not tip Eliot off that Nancy was suspicious of him, so she and Ned left to find Professor Norden's office. It was in a different building, and they had to go outside. It was late afternoon by now, although this time of year that meant that sunset would not be long in coming.

"Eliot was more helpful than we might have expected," Ned commented as he and Nancy walked. "I can't help but feel even more suspicious of him than ever, even though that kind of a ridiculous way to feel about someone being helpful."

"He could still be up to something," Nancy said. "Maybe going to Professor Norden's office is another trap."

When they arrived, however, they found the professor bent over his desk with his door open. He looked up when he heard them approach.

"Oh…Nancy, wasn't it? And I don't believe I know you." He didn't make much effort to sound happy to see them.

Ned introduced himself, and then Nancy said, "I have a few more questions to ask you."

Professor Norden sighed. "Go ahead. I'm in the middle of something important, but you're a persistent young woman, I can see. You probably won't give up until I answer your questions, so I might as well not try to fight it. Make it quick, though. I don't have time for small talk."

Nancy glanced at Ned. "Okay, well, first I wanted to tell you that I received a call from the 'ghost' earlier. When we tried calling the number back, all we got was a message saying that the number has been disconnected. We did a little bit of research and found out that the number, at one point, belonged to a woman named Claire Norden. Do you know her?"

All the color drained from Norden's face at the mention of the name, and he didn't seem to be able to reply for several seconds. Finally, he managed to say, "I don't know anyone by that name."

Nancy and Ned shared an incredulous glance. They had both seen suspects deny some obvious things before, but this was truly ridiculous.

"Are you sure about that?" Ned ventured.

"No. I mean, yes," Norden replied, obviously straining to collect himself. "I thought for a moment that the name was familiar, but I really don't know anyone by that name."

"She worked at this college at one point," Nancy told him. "It seems a little odd that you would share a last name and a workplace and you wouldn't know each other."

"This college employs quite a few people," Norden said. "They're the biggest employer in this town. I can't possibly know everyone who works here. I'm sorry. I simply can't help you. Now, if you don't mind, I really do have some work I need to do."

He stood up, practically pushed them out the door, and then closed it after them.

"I'd say he definitely knows who Claire Norden is," Ned commented. "I wonder why he doesn't want to talk about her."

Nancy shook her head. "Hopefully George and Burt can find the answer to that."

They returned to the library, where George and Burt were doing their research via mobile data on their smartphones. When Ned and Nancy arrived, they found that Bess and Dave were also waiting there.

"Any luck?" Nancy asked them.

"Hadley just went straight back to her dorm," Bess told her.

"Well, we didn't learn very much more," Nancy said. "Professor Norden refused to say anything about Claire, but we're both certain that he knows who she is."

"I should say so." George looked up from her phone. "I haven't been able to dig up too much on Claire, except an obituary. Apparently, she died fourteen years ago. From what I can see, she lived a pretty quiet, normal life, working in Admissions here at Emerson. There was just one interesting tidbit of information: when she died, she was survived by a husband named Myles Norden."

"She was married to Professor Norden?" Ned asked.

"Apparently," George said, "unless there's another Myles Norden who's a professor at this college running around."

"Then why would he deny knowing her?" Ned shook his head in confusion.

Nancy tapped her chin a few times thoughtfully. "Why if someone is specifically targeting Professor Norden? All the supposedly ghostly happenings would be bound to catch his attention, and don't forget, Hadley said that the light bulbs outside his office also blew once when she was there. This person could have a grudge against him or they're trying to trick him into something. In addition to the 'ghosts', they could be using his dead wife to get to him."

"But what about the ghost calling to you down by the river and then the whole thing with the phone call and the basement?" Ned pointed out. "There's no connection between you and Norden, so it doesn't make sense that anyone would be targeting both of you."

"That's true," Nancy agreed. "Still, I have a feeling that Professor Norden is bound up in all of this somehow."


	10. The Winter Festival Dance

J.M.J.

_Author's note: Once again, thank you so much for continuing to read this story and for following/favoriting/reviewing! I hope you're enjoying this story._

**Chapter X**

**The Winter Festival Dance**

Long before evening had arrived and the Winter Festival Dance was scheduled to begin, the electricity had been restored. Evidently, the black-out had been caused simply by the main breaker being flipped, making it clear that a human perpetrator must have been at work. Who and why still remained a question, and Nancy was deep in thought over it at the dance.

For everyone else, the dance was a success so far. There was a live band, food, and simple but elegant decorations in white and icy blue with Christmas lights lending a comfortable atmosphere. The crowd was in an amiable mood, and there were already quite a few couples dancing. Bess and Dave were among them. They were both far too fond of dancing to sit very many dances out. George and Burt had gone to look over the food tables, since none of their group had eaten yet, while Nancy and Ned sat on the sidelines of the dance and talked softly.

"Is something bothering you?" Ned asked finally after noticing that Nancy didn't seem to be paying much attention to what he was saying and was simply agreeing with him.

Nancy started and turned to look at him. "Sorry, Ned. I guess I'm just preoccupied with the mystery."

"I wouldn't say you're _just_ preoccupied," Ned replied. "There's something else, too, isn't there? When you've got a mystery on your mind, you're usually more excited than this."

Nancy smiled ruefully. "Sometimes I think you're a better detective than I am. I can't hide anything from you, can I?"

"I thought you were just trying to make things easy for me. But seriously, Nancy, what's up? I thought you were making pretty good progress on the mystery. That breakthrough about Claire Norden was definitely something and it confirms that Professor Norden has got some secrets."

"Yeah. I'm just not sure how Claire Norden and Jack Delance could possibly be connected. Maybe if Claire had fallen through the ice, too, I could see it, but apparently she died of natural causes. That's not what's worrying me, though. I was just thinking about earlier, with the basement and all."

Ned bit his lip. "That might not have been the greatest idea you've ever had."

"As in, I was really stupid going down there by myself, huh?"

"I wouldn't say that," Ned assured her. "You saw a chance to solve the mystery that couldn't wait, so you took it. It isn't like you haven't done things like that before."

"Usually with the same results. If only I'd learn to stop and think before I act. I'm going to get myself into trouble that I can't get out of one of these times if I don't."

"You can't expect yourself to not have flaws, Nancy. That's what makes a person human."

Nancy gave him a quizzical look. "I'm not in a good business to have flaws. When you're a detective, it really only takes one mistake to end your career, or worse."

"Right." Ned wrinkled his forehead in thought. "Still, knowing that you have a particular flaw is the first step to overcoming it. It's one thing to rush into dangerous situations without thinking them over and acting like that's a good technique as a detective, and it's another to realize that that's a problem and want to do better. You've just got to be patient with yourself about it."

"And what about the meantime, when I keep letting myself get locked in basements and closets and who knows what else?" Nancy allowed a mischievous glint in her eyes.

Ned grinned and put his arm around her. "That's what you have me for, to try to keep you from getting locked up in the first place, and if I can't to let you out again. At least, this way, it gives you a reason why you need me so I know you'll keep me around."

"There are a thousand reasons why I need you," Nancy told him, "but even if there wasn't a single one, I'd still want you."

Ned blushed and became tongue-tied, and Nancy laughed.

"I guess there's no point in being so serious," she said. "We're supposed to be having fun tonight. We've been looking forward to this for weeks. Do you want to dance?"

"Definitely."

Ned stood up and bowed to Nancy as she curtsied to him. Then, laughing, they went out onto the dance floor.

The band had just struck up an even livelier tune, and those couples who knew how began to swing dance. Bess and Dave were among those couples, and were probably some of the best on the floor. For several minutes, they enjoyed the dance, and several people on the sidelines were watching them in admiration. Then, all at once, Bess stepped wrong on her high heels and turned her ankle.

Dave caught her before she could fall. "Are you okay?" he asked in concern.

"Yeah," Bess replied after she took a moment to decide for herself. "I think I'm going to have to sit the rest of the dance out, though."

Dave helped her limp over to the sidelines and sit down. Bess took her shoe off and looked at it in disgust.

"Whatever movies say, high heels are not very good for dancing in," she observed as she began to rub her ankle.

"Is it swelling?" Dave asked. "Do you want me to go get some ice?"

"No, it's okay," Bess assured him. Her eye fell on the snack table on the other side of the room. "If we're going to be sitting out dancing, anyway, though, some cookies would be fantastic."

"I'll be right back," Dave replied, and immediately headed off to the snack table.

While he was gone, Bess concentrated on rubbing her sore ankle. She didn't think she had sprained it, but it certainly hurt more than she might have expected. Hopefully, she would recover well enough to walk out of the dance on her own. It would be so embarrassing if Dave had to carry her. Well, maybe that wouldn't be so very bad. She grinned a little at the thought.

"Oh, Beth, I'm glad I found you." She was startled out of her thoughts by Hadley approaching. Unlike most of the other women at the dance, Hadley was simply wearing jeans and a sweater, but it was her concerned expression that surprised Bess more than anything.

"It's Bess, actually," Bess corrected her. "What's wrong?"

Hadley tapped her fingertips together nervously. "Plenty. Is Nancy somewhere around here? Please tell me she is. I _need_ to talk to her."

Bess pointed out her friend who was still on the dance floor. "What's going on? I thought you had gone back to your dorm to relax."

"I did. For several hours. It was so nice. I watched three episodes of this new TV series I'm into, and then I realized that I have this mega-long paper that's due on Monday, and I really needed to work on it, so I wrote a little bit of that, and then Joanna called me and said I had to come to the dance and it wasn't fair flaking out on everyone. Okay, point taken, but when I got here, the first person I ran into was Eliot and he told me…Oh, shoot, here he comes now." Hadley slid into the seat beside Bess. "Pretend you're talking to me."

"I thought I was," Bess replied, looking over her shoulder to try to spot Eliot, but she didn't see him anywhere in the crowd.

"Don't look!" Hadley told her. "Then he'll know we're talking about him."

"Eliot?" Bess asked.

"Of course not. Pay attention." Hadley evidently didn't realize that she hadn't said who they were apparently talking about. "Eliot's a senior, you know, and Norden is his mentor for his senior project, which is all about, you guessed it, paranormal psychology. They've been doing some field studies – which are super interesting, actually. If you get the chance, you really should talk to Eliot about them. He's got this theory that spirits can only interact with humans when they're in just the right frame of mind, and…"

"That's fascinating," Bess interrupted, sneaking a surreptitious glance over her shoulder to see if anyone seemed particularly interested in their conversation, "but isn't it more important to talk about whoever you're trying to avoid?"

"Oh, right, yeah." Hadley took a deep breath as if she had to collect her thoughts. "I, uh…Wow, you really went all out with your dress, didn't you, Beth?"

"Huh?" Bess looked up to see that Liam Rodgers had just approached them. She wondered if he was the person Hadley was trying to avoid, or if she just didn't want anyone else to overhear what she had to say.

"Hey, Hadley," he said, ignoring Bess entirely. "How'd you like to dance?"

Hadley scoffed. "I'm not exactly the dancing kind. I'm just here as part of the committee."

"I thought you might make an exception for me," Liam said. "You did promise."

"I literally have no recollection of that," Hadley replied.

"Surely you don't have anything against me?" Liam asked.

Hadley hesitated. Then she said, "No, of course not. You're one of the nicest creeps in this entire college. I have no idea why girls aren't throwing themselves at your feet all the time. Now, if you don't mind, I'm hanging with my best bud, Beth, here." She put her arm around Bess's shoulders.

Liam raised his eyebrows. "Um, you do realize her name is Bess, not Beth, right?"

"Uh, yeah, obviously," Hadley replied, despite appearing to be flustered. "If you'll excuse me, I need to go get some water."

She stood up and practically ran off with Liam right behind her. Bess watched them go in confusion. At first, she had assumed that Hadley's earth-shattering news had been connected to the mystery, but now she was wondering if it was that Liam had been hitting on her and she didn't like it.

She looked around and tried to spot Dave over by the food table, but he was nowhere in sight. A puzzled frown passed over her face. That wasn't like Dave at all leave her high and dry. Where could he have gone and why? She really wanted someone to sit with her and talk to her. Ned and Nancy were still dancing, and she spotted George and Burt talking to a group of people in another part of the room. Suddenly, she felt lonely.

Then, all at once, the lights flickered, and then went out. The din of conversation was instantly replaced by a hush as everyone waited to see whether this was part of the program or not. Then there was a long, loud, feminine scream followed by a screech of, "The stage!"

Bess looked in that direction and caught her breath when she saw a bluish light hovering over it in a vaguely human outline. She didn't have long to look at it, though, for all at once, a hand was clapped over her mouth, and someone dragged her out of her chair and began pulling her away.


	11. A Disturbing Disappearance

J.M.J.

_Author's note: Once again, thank you for continuing to read and particularly for leaving a review to let me know what you think!_

**Chapter XI**

**A Disturbing Disappearance**

A few minutes before the lights went out and the ghost put in an appearance, Dave was dishing up snacks at the snack table. He made sure to take some of Bess's favorite types of cookies as well as anything else that looked good, which was almost everything on the table. He realized then that there was too much food for even two people to eat and then that there were two girls off to his left staring at him with judgmental eyes. He abruptly turned his back on them and began heading back to Bess.

He had barely gone two steps when Eliot Beckman fell into step beside him. "I've been looking for someone from your group," Eliot said. "You're one of Nancy Drew's friends, aren't you?"

"Yeah," Dave replied. "Why?"

"Did you talk to Professor Norden?"

"Nancy did." Dave looked at him uncertainly. "Wait. How do you know I'm one of Nancy's friends? I wasn't with her and Ned when they talked to you earlier."

"You've all been hanging out together all weekend," Eliot replied. "Then, to top it all off, you arrived here together tonight. Look, did Professor Norden give Nancy any information?"

"You'd have to talk to Nancy about that." Dave was beginning to get an uneasy feeling about Eliot's questions. He didn't want to give anything away just in case Eliot was behind…whatever was going on. Nancy would know just how much to tell, though.

"I really need to know," Eliot went on. "I'm worried about Norden. I saw him about an hour ago, and he was really shaken up. He wouldn't say what the problem was. And then…"

The lights flickered in the middle of Eliot's sentence. Then they went out entirely. There was a scream of "The stage!" When Dave looked in that direction, he saw a bluish light in the rough form of a person up on the stage.

"What the…" he began just as someone jostled his arm in the dark and he dropped the plate full of desserts.

Nancy spotted the light immediately when it appeared. She grabbed Ned's hand and pulled him toward the stage. "Come on!"

Ned followed her willingly, but they had only just reached the stage steps when the figure vanished and the lights came back on. Nancy stopped in mid-stride, a frown on her face. There was silence for a second or two, and then the hall erupted into the noise of over a hundred people talking all at once.

"What do you make of it?" Ned asked Nancy as they stepped back down.

"I don't know," Nancy admitted. "That's why I wanted to get up close to it. My guess is that it was a projector of some kind."

"But they would have had to be projecting onto something," Ned reminded her.

"It could have been the curtain at the back of the stage," Nancy said, looking at it thoughtfully. "It wasn't there long enough to tell. I'm sure there wasn't time for anyone to put up a collapsible screen of any kind."

At that moment, George and Burt came trotting up.

"The 'ghost' strikes again," George observed. "Whoever it is really has it out for this festival."

"Or somebody here," Burt added. "Nancy, what if they really are after you?"

"That just doesn't add up with everything that's happened," Nancy said. "The ghost sightings started several weeks ago. I suppose, if the 'ghost' really is after me, that could be a way to make that look less obvious, but then why would they have thrown everything they had worked for away and call to me down by the river?"

"Maybe they're just trying to make it look like you're at the center of it when really it's someone else who is the target?" George suggested.

"I'm afraid that's exactly what's going on," Eliot Beckman broke in as he approached the group. "Let's step away from the crowd. I don't want anyone overhearing this who doesn't have any business listening." They made their way into one corner, and Eliot began speaking in a low voice. The first thing he did was ask about Nancy's conversation with Professor Norden earlier that day. "Did you ask him anything that would upset him?"

"Possibly," Nancy admitted, although she didn't want to confirm. "Why? Do you know something about all this?"

"I know he was terribly upset about an hour ago," Eliot explained. "I tried to get him to tell me what the matter was, but he wouldn't talk. He just said he was going to go back to his apartment. This happened outside, by his car. He reached into his pocket then to pull out his keys, and he dropped a piece of paper out of his pocket. The wind blew it a few feet, and so I went to pick it up, and by the time I did, he had driven away. I've still got that piece of paper. I'll show it to you."

He pulled a folded half-sheet of paper from his pocket and handed it to Nancy. Nancy unfolded it to see that it was a typed message reading:

"_Norden, you can't hide from your past forever. It will catch up to you."_

"It sounds like a threat to me," Eliot said.

"It could be," Nancy agreed. "Do you know what it's talking about?"

Eliot hesitated and then he shook his head. "Nothing definite. Some of the people who have been around this college for long at all have hinted to me that Norden might have a few skeletons rattling around in his closet, but I don't what they are. I don't know if he told you this, but we did find evidence that the supposed hauntings in the woods are fake. At least, we found some snowmobile tracks near where they happen and some wires. Norden was pretty disgusted. He didn't want to look into it anymore after that."

"He told us he hadn't looked into it at all," Ned pointed out.

"Yeah." Eliot looked at the floor. "Most people look at Norden's field of study as some kind of joke. This wouldn't be the first time someone played a practical joke on him, faking a haunting to make him look stupid, but it is definitely more elaborate than anyone has tried before. I'm worried about him. I feel like there might be something more going on here than any of us quite realize."

At that moment, Dave joined the group with a worried frown on his face. "Do any of you know where Bess went?"

"No. You were probably the last person to see her," George told him.

"I wouldn't be so worried," Dave explained, "but she had twisted her ankle. I don't think she would have walked far on it by herself."

"Have you tried calling her?" Burt suggested.

Dave nodded. "Her phone goes straight to voicemail. You don't think something happened to her when the lights went out, do you?"

"Let's not panic," Nancy suggested. "Her phone might have died, and maybe her ankle doesn't hurt as much as she thought at first. Let's spread out and see if we can find her."

"What about Norden?" Eliot asked.

"We'll look for Bess first and then we'll see what we can learn about Professor Norden," Nancy promised.

They spread out. Several people were leaving, declaring that they had had enough of practical jokes or admitting to really being scared. Others were sticking around, talking excitedly about the "ghost" they had just seen. Bess was nowhere to be found.

The group reconvened in the same place where they had been talking before, and where Eliot had waited for them. They were all beginning to be concerned.

"Bess wouldn't have just left without telling anyone, even if she could," Dave insisted.

"I agree," Nancy said. "I'm starting to think that the 'ghost' was a diversion."

"So someone could kidnap Bess?" George asked, speaking quietly only with difficulty. "But why?"

"I have no idea," Nancy admitted.

At that moment, her phone buzzed with a text. She saw that it was from the same number that had lured her into the basement, and so she opened the text with apprehension. It said simply, _"Your friend is down by the river."_

"Sounds like a trap to me," George said, having read the text over Nancy's shoulder.

Nancy nodded slowly. "But we can't afford to just ignore it."

"What if this is another diversion?" Eliot protested. "I'm sure Norden is the real target of this phony ghost. Maybe they just took your friend to make sure you're out of the way while they do something to him. They clearly see you as a threat and are trying to scare you off."

Nancy hesitated. "You said that Professor Norden was going home?"

"That's what he said, anyway," Eliot told her. "I know where he lives. I had to go there once. We've got to make sure he's okay."

"How about this?" Ned suggested. "There's six of us standing here. What if Nancy and I go to the river to reconnoiter? If we're careful, we can keep out of sight from anyone waiting for us there. The rest of you can go check on Professor Norden."

"I want to go look for Bess," Dave insisted.

"Me too," George added.

Ned shook his head. "The fewer of us who go to the river, the less likely we'll be seen. We're just going to go see what the situation is. If there's any danger at all, we'll call for you and the police before we do anything." He was also thinking that he was the least likely of the group to do anything reckless, but he didn't want to say so aloud.

It took some persuading, but finally George and Dave gave in. The group separated, and Dave offered his SUV for the drive to Professor Norden's home.

"Let's make this fast," he said as he slid behind the wheel.

"Right," Eliot agreed, taking the front passenger seat. "If Norden's in trouble, we need to get to him right away."

Dave was about to say that he was actually thinking more of Bess, but before he could, Burt leaned forward and asked, "You said you've tried calling him, right?"

"That's right, but he doesn't answer," Eliot said.

"So, you don't really have any way of knowing for sure that he went home?" Burt asked.

"Well, no," Eliot admitted. "I just know what he said. He doesn't live too far from here, so it won't take us long to check and see if he's at home."

Following Eliot's directions, Dave drove to a small apartment duplex about a mile away from the college. Eliot pointed out the apartment on the left side as being Professor Norden's and confirmed that the Camaro in the driveway was Norden's. However, there were no light on in the apartment.

Dave glanced at the clock in the dashboard. "It's nine o'clock. I guess he could have gone to bed already."

"We'll just have to wake him up then." George opened the door to the SUV and climbed out. "It seems kind of rude to drag somebody out of bed just to ask him if he's all right, but we don't have a choice."

She reached the door before any of the boys did and pressed the door bell. She could faintly hear it ringing inside, but there was no answer. She pressed it again.

"Look, I'm really worried," Eliot said. "There's a back door. Let's go see if it's open."

The others looked at one another, but then they agreed. They might as well be doing something useful while they waited for Nancy and Ned to call and report. They followed Eliot around to the back door. He rattled the handle, but it didn't turn.

"Hey, look at this." George pointed to window next to the door that was open a crack.

"There must be something wrong," Eliot declared. "No one would leave a window open in this cold."

George pushed the window open all the way. "I'll climb in and open the door for you guys. Just hold on a second."

She scrambled through the window and then fumbled around for a light switch. She found one and snapped it on. Immediately, she spotted a man's body lying on the floor a few feet away. She stared for a second or two and then pushed the door open.

"Hurry, guys," she urged them as she rushed to the man's side. The first thing she did was to check for a pulse.

"It's Norden," Eliot declared, too shocked to do anything but stand and stare.

Burt and Dave knelt down next to Norden.

"He's alive," George informed them.

"Yeah, but it looks like he's been stabbed." Burt pointed to a bleeding wound in the man's abdomen.


	12. Treacherous Ice

J.M.J.

_Author's note: Thanks so much for continuing to read! I would love it if you would take the time to leave a review. It really helps to encourage me, plus it lets me know what I'm doing right and what I need to work on. I suppose I should probably apologize for a significantly shorter chapter this time. I'm afraid I can't resist the lure of a cliffhanger…_

**Chapter XII**

**Treacherous Ice**

Nancy and Ned's first stop was Ned's dorm and then Nancy's hotel room so that they could retrieve their snowshoes and change into more appropriate clothes for hiking in the snow. Nancy also enabled the tracking app on her phone so that George would be able to find them if anything happened and they weren't able to call.

"Are you ready?" Nancy asked as she climbed into the front passenger seat of Ned's car. "We'd better make a plan this time. There's not a lot of cover going down to the river, at least not in the place where we went down last time. We'll have to pick another place to come down if we want to avoid anyone seeing us."

"Right," Ned agreed. "We'll watch for somewhere along the way with more brush. Hopefully that supposed ghost doesn't have any particular time frame in mind."

"He didn't say anything," Nancy replied. "I think if he starts getting too impatient, he'll text again. I'm just hoping it doesn't take George and the guys too long to check on Professor Norden."

"Do you think Eliot was telling the truth?" Ned asked as he eased his car onto the icy street. "What if he's in on the whole ghost charade and his story about Norden being in trouble was just meant to distract us from looking for Bess? Maybe we shouldn't have split up after all."

"I thought of that," Nancy admitted. "I have a pretty strong hunch that he's telling the truth and really is concerned about Norden, and we don't have the time to waste standing around and wondering about it. Checking on Norden is the fastest way to learn anything at all, and George, Burt, and Dave can take care of themselves. Let's focus on finding Bess right now."

Ned took the drive to the river slowly, both because of the poor driving conditions and also to watch out for a good place to make their way down to the riverbank unseen. Finally, they spotted a stand of trees where they could park the car in relative secrecy, and it was far enough away from the location of the haunting that they could proceed toward the river without anyone waiting there seeing them.

It was still about a half mile away from the spot where the ghost sightings usually occurred, and the temperatures were hovering around zero degrees Fahrenheit. The snowshoes helped for allowing Nancy and Ned to walk quickly, but even so, it took nearly twenty minutes for them to arrive.

The moon was reflecting off the snow, making the landscape bright but full of shadows. The frozen river showed clearly, and Nancy and Ned slowed as they approached it. It was completely still and quiet except for the crunch of snow underneath their feet. They paused and crouched low to the ground, looking around for any sign of a person nearby.

"I don't see anyone," Ned whispered finally. "Either they're not here or they're waiting for us to show ourselves. We'd better head back."

"Let's wait just a few more minutes," Nancy replied.

They fell silent again and waited and watched. The few minutes dragged by with absolutely nothing, no sound, no movement, to attract their attention. Ned was about to suggest heading back again when a faint blue light appeared in the trees across the river. Nancy squeezed Ned's arm to alert him to it, and they both watched it.

It was too far back in the trees to tell whether it was the familiar human form that they had seen before. Nancy hoped that it might come closer so that they could get a better look at it, but it didn't appear to be moving at all.

"Let's get a closer look," Nancy whispered.

"It could be a trap," Ned reminded her.

Nancy paused, remembering the conversation they had had only a couple of hours earlier. This was different, though, she reasoned. There really wasn't any time to go back or call for help, and George, Burt, and Dave already knew where they were and would be coming before long. The light was there now and it could disappear at any second. Catching it – and more importantly, whoever was behind it – could be the fastest way to solve the mystery, and with Bess missing, Nancy couldn't afford to delay.

"You stay here until I get across the river," Nancy said. "If anyone approaches me or I get into any trouble, you'll be right here to help me out. We can't just throw away the chance to catch the ghost."

"Okay," Ned agreed reluctantly.

Nancy stood up and approached the river cautiously, looking all around her for any sign of someone watching. The blue light on the other side was the only indication that anyone else was nearby. She carefully set one foot on the ice, testing it before she trusted her full weight to it. It seemed to be solid, so she placed the other foot on it as well. It was covered with snow, too, which would help provide better footing than the bare ice would have. Then she started across, being sure to test her footing with every step, even though she chafed at the delay. There was an ominous creak a couple of times, and whenever it happened, Nancy would stop and catch her breath.

Finally, she reached the opposite bank. The blue light was still shining, but the trees continued to obscure it from view. Nancy beckoned for Ned to follow as she crept a little bit closer.

Ned watched nervously as Nancy crossed the river, fearing any minute that she might break through the ice, which had been thin and treacherous only two days earlier. He breathed a sigh of relief when he saw her begin climbing the opposite bank. Then Nancy turned and gestured for him to follow, and so he cautiously approached the ice himself.

He decided to follow in Nancy's footsteps, since that was clearly a safe path across, but even so, he walked slowly and put his feet down with care, not trusting the ice even now. Then he looked up and saw that Nancy was already disappearing into the trees on the opposite side of the river. Ned didn't want her to get too far ahead, so he quickened his pace.

He had only taken about two steps at this new pace when he foot hit a patch of bare ice. He threw his arms out to try to steady himself, but his knees still hit the ice hard. It must have been on a thin piece of ice, because it cracked underneath him and plunged him with a shout into the freezing water below.


	13. The Cabin in the Woods

J.M.J.

_Author's note: Thank you so much for reading! And thank you to Rose12 and angelicalkiss for the reviews on the last chapter! I'm glad you're still reading and enjoying the story and I really appreciate the feedback! Yeah, the polar plunge was a little bit predictable, but I couldn't resist, and it also actually does help drive the storyline forward. So, without further ado, here is the next chapter…_

**Chapter XIII**

**The Cabin in the Woods**

Ned's shout reached Nancy's ears while she was in midstep. She whirled around just in time to see Ned disappear into the frigid water. Forgetting the blue light and the ghost and even Bess, she ran back down to the ice, shouting Ned's name as she went.

Her foot slipped as soon as she reached the ice, and she had the presence of mind to slow down, although she was no less frantic as she did so. After what seemed like an eternity, she reached the hole in the ice. She looked down into the dark water.

"Ned, where are you?" she said in a pleading tone. She realized that if the current had carried him under the ice, she would never find him, and he would never have a chance to make his way back to the surface. Every second seemed an hour as Nancy realized that every one that passed lessened Ned's chances of survival. She breathed a prayer as she continued to watch.

Then, suddenly, Ned's hand came up out of the water. Instantly, Nancy reached out and grabbed it, towing him closer to her and pulling him up so that his head was out of the water. He was only semi-conscious from the shock of the cold water and could do nothing for himself. Nancy tried to pull him out of the water, but he was too heavy and she had no traction on the ice. Then, to make matters worse, she heard the ice creak and groan, threatening to plunge her into the water as well.

Nancy felt herself begin to panic. She had to think of something quick, but the only thing she could think was that she needed help. She whispered another prayer for strength as she tried once more to heave Ned up onto the ice beside her.

"Hold on! I'm coming!"

The voice was so unexpected and yet so welcome that for a second or two, Nancy couldn't believe that she had really heard it. She looked over her shoulder to see a teenage boy, a few years younger than herself hurrying toward her out of the trees on the far side of the river, where she herself had only just come from.

"Hurry!" she called back to him, as soon as she could find her voice. Then she added, "But be careful!"

"I know," the boy replied.

He slowed down when he reached the edge of the water and began carefully making his way across to Nancy.

"Wait," Nancy warned him as he neared her. "The ice is thin here. Maybe it would be better if we tried a different spot."

The boy nodded. He picked a spot along the edge of the hole a few feet away from Nancy. Then Nancy towed Ned over toward it, inching carefully so as not to put any more strain on the ice than she could help. To her relief, the ice seemed sturdier here.

The boy grabbed Ned's other arm close to the shoulder, and Nancy reached down to grip the arm that she was holding closer to his shoulder. Then together, they lifted him out onto the ice.

"Ned, can you hear me?" Nancy asked, turning him over so that he was lying on his back and propping his head on her knee.

There was a pause for several seconds and then Ned replied in a fairly incoherent voice, "Yeah."

"We need to get him out of the cold right away," the boy said.

"The car's the closest place," Nancy said, "unless you have a car that's closer."

"No," the boy told her, "but I lived around here. There's a cabin closer than the road, on the opposite side of the river. There'll be blankets and hot drinks there, too."

"That's sounds like a better idea," Nancy said, "if we can get inside."

"That won't be a problem," the boy replied. "Come on. We've got to get him up."

Getting Ned to his feet was no easy task. He was a good deal bigger and taller than either of them, and he was both weak and dazed. He leaned heavily on both of them and could hardly walk so that they ended up dragging him more than helping him walk.

Fortunately, the boy was right and there was a cabin only just out of sight of the river in the trees. He opened the front door and switched on the light before helping Nancy get Ned inside.

It was only a three-room cabin with the front room being a combination kitchen, dining room, and living room and the other two rooms being a bedroom and a bathroom. It was chilly inside, since the heat had only been turned up enough to keep the pipes from freezing, but the strange boy immediately turned the thermostat up.

"We've got to get those wet clothes off him," he said, turning away from the thermostat. "And then wrap him up with blankets. If you don't mind, since we don't have much heat in here yet, it would be better if you were in the blankets, too."

"I know," Nancy replied. "I've had some first aid training."

"No need just standing around then," the boy said. "Let's go."

They helped Ned to sit on the sofa and the boy pulled off his coat while Nancy took off his boots and socks.

"Wh…what…" Ned protested as the boy began removing his shirt.

"Sorry," the boy said. "I'll go find some blankets."

Before long, they had the task accomplished, and Nancy wrapped a blanket around both herself and Ned, who was dangerously close to falling asleep. She kept talking to him and shaking him gently to keep him awake. The boy piled a couple more blankets over them and then said he was going to see what else he could find.

"Hot water bottles!" he announced, holding one up in each hand as he emerged from the bathroom. "And look, a kettle. I'll start warming up some water."  
Nancy checked her phone. "I don't have any reception here. Do you?"

"I don't even have a phone," the boy told her. "I'm sure it will be all right. If worse comes to worse, I can go for help."

"Do you know how to drive?" Nancy asked. "If you do, you could take Ned's car into town. Otherwise, I don't think you'd better set out on foot."

"I can drive," the boy assured her, "but I also know these woods. I've spent a lot of time exploring them. Still, it's cold out there. It's not a good night to be out and about."

"What were you doing out in the woods?" Nancy asked.

The boy shrugged but didn't offer any answer. Instead, he announced, "I think the water's hot enough now. We don't want it too hot."

He filled the bottles and handed them to Nancy, who placed them against Ned. "Thank you. For everything. You seem to know a lot about first aid. What's your name?"

"Jack."

Nancy raised an eyebrow. "As in Jack Delance?"

Jack laughed. "So you've heard that story about the local ghost roaming the woods, glowing blue." His face fell. "I think somebody's up to something."

"Have you seen it then?"

"Plenty of times." Jack looked critically at Nancy. "That's why you were down by the river tonight, isn't it? You're trying to find out who's behind it."

"How did you know?" Nancy asked.

"You wouldn't be the first." Jack shrugged and then looked thoughtful. "You know, the legends about Jack are wrong."

Nancy raised her eyebrows at this. "Do you mean there never was any Jack Delance?"

"No, that part's true, and he did fall in the frozen river and drown. The part that isn't true is when they claim no one ever found his body. They did, later. He's buried in the cemetery in town. You should visit his grave if you're interested in the story."

"What could I learn from doing that?"

"You could learn a lot if you keep your eyes open," Jack told her.

"Nancy always has her eyes open," Ned said, sounding more coherent now.

Instantly, Nancy's attention turned back to him and she put all thoughts of the ghost and questions about Jack and his cryptic remarks aside for the moment. "Are you okay, Ned?"

"Just cold," Ned replied, shivering as he said it.

Jack poured water from the kettle into a mug and stirred in some hot chocolate mix that he had found in the cupboard. He handed it to Ned. "Drink that slowly. It will help."

"Do you know who owns this cabin, Jack?" Nancy asked. "I'd like to thank them for the use of it and pay them back for everything we use."

"I don't know them personally," Jack replied, "but it's a family named Rodgers. They only come here for vacations. I can make sure to get the message to them. Now, what about me going for help?"

Nancy looked critically at Ned, who seemed to be reviving. "I don't think you should cross that ice again if it's not absolutely necessary, and I don't think it is. It's probably best to stay here for the night. Your parents and our friends will be worried, of course, but I think that's better than taking a chance on going out in the dark again."

"I agree," Ned added. "I'm fine. I just need to warm up."

"Okay," Jack said. "That's fine with me. The problem is that there's only one bed in the bedroom and only one sofa here. There's no shortage of pillows and blankets, though. I don't have any objection to sleeping on the floor."

In the end, they decided to let Ned stay where he was on the sofa. Jack built a huge pile of pillows and blankets for himself on the floor of the main room and insisted that he was comfortable, so Nancy took the bed, but not without feeling a little guilty.

"I don't suppose you two could look for some clothes for me?" Ned asked, pulling the blankets tight around him.

"Sure," Nancy agreed. "Just hold on."

The modest sized bedroom had both a closet and a dresser. Jack began looking through the closet while Nancy opened one of the dresser drawers. Instead of clothes, it was full of electronics.

"Strange," Nancy commented, pulling them out and setting them on top of the dresser. There were numerous extra long cords, a couple of thumb drives, a set of small but powerful speakers, and a small projector. It only took a moment to set the projector up and turn it on. It had a USB port, and so Nancy plugged one of the thumb drives into it. Immediately, a blue light in the vague figure of a person flickered onto the wall.

Jack whistled. "Well. What do you know? I guess we've just found out how the ghost works."

Nancy pulled a thin sheet out of the bottom of the drawer. "They must have projected the image onto this sheet, or another one like it. They probably have extra equipment, considering that they were set up at the dance a few hours ago. All these extra cords must be so they can reach from the cabin to the river. I'll bet there's another set of speakers permanently set up down at the river. That's probably where the ghostly voice came from the other day."

"What are you going to do about it?" Jack asked.

Nancy turned to him. "You said that the people who own this cabin are named Rodgers. Spelled R-O-D-G-E-R-S?"

"That's right," Jack replied.

"Then I think I know where to begin looking first thing in the morning," Nancy said. "I just hope the owners of this cabin don't come back before we leave. We don't exactly have any way to handle them if they do."

"I don't think they will," Jack told her. "It's past one in the morning. If they haven't come back yet tonight, I doubt they're going to."

"Hopefully," Nancy said. "We'll leave first thing in the morning."

The other drawers in the dresser held more typical contents, and Nancy found a sweater, a pair of sweatpants, and some wool socks that looked as if they would fit Ned fairly well. After that, since Ned had stopped shivering and seemed pretty well his normal self again, Nancy and Jack decided it would be safe to let him go to sleep, and so they each crawled into their own beds.

Nancy, however, was awake for a long time afterward. She now knew how the "ghost" worked and had a good idea of at least one person who was behind it. It still didn't explain why, but Nancy could learn that after she had caught the culprit. Her thoughts wandered to Bess, and frustration rose up in her that there was nothing she could do for her friend right now except hope and pray that she could rescue her in time.


	14. Findings

J.M.J.

_Author's note: Thanks so much for reading! We're in the home stretch now. I can't say exactly how many more chapters there will be (yeah, I have a bad habit of posting as I write instead of getting something completely written before I start posting it), but there definitely won't be more than three, or four at the very, very most._

**Chapter XIV**

**Findings**

George tapped her foot on the floor of the hospital waiting room, compulsively checking her phone every few minutes. There had been no word from Nancy, and George was starting to worry. What if something had happened to Nancy and Ned? Even if nothing had, they were wasting time that they could spend looking for Bess.

Burt was sitting next to her, twiddling his thumbs uncomfortably as they waited for some news – about Nancy and Ned, or about Bess, or about Norden, or anything. They had followed the ambulance to the hospital to give Eliot a ride, but after Norden had been whisked into the emergency room, they hadn't heard another word. The police had already questioned Burt and his friends, although they were still talking to Eliot in low voices on the other end of the waiting room.

Dave, meanwhile, was pacing nervously back and forth. He kept thinking about how, if he had only not let Eliot distract him, he would have been right there with Bess and she would have never been kidnapped. He paused. Eliot had distracted him to tell him about some vague, dire concerns for his professor which somehow had turned out to be well-founded. Not only that, but he had also been involved in splitting their group up with his insistence that they go check up on Norden, just in the nick of time to rescue him. What if all of that hadn't been coincidence? What if Eliot knew more about all this than he was saying?

"Guys, we need to talk about something," Dave whispered as he slid into the other seat next to George.

"What?" Burt asked as they all huddled closer so that they could speak quietly.

Dave explained his suspicions of Eliot, while Burt and George listened closely.

"That makes sense," George agreed after taking a moment to think it over when Dave had finished. "If it's true, then Nancy and Ned are probably in trouble. Maybe we should go look for them."

"But then Eliot will get away," Dave protested. "He probably knows where Bess is."

George looked up toward Eliot and considered her options. "I'm going to tell the police about this. They'll be able to keep Eliot here and send some people to help us look for Nancy and Ned."

She stood up and approached the nearest officer, whose name was Brady. He listened with interest to the theory.

Officer Brady nodded when she finished. "I'll call for more officers to go with you down to the river. We'll make sure Eliot doesn't leave until we've heard what you find out."

NDNDNDNDND

The temperature was dropping below zero rapidly and it was nearly four in the morning. The police car, with two officers in the front seat and George, Burt, and Dave in the back seat, crawled along the road down to the river slowly. They had nearly reached the place where the friends had parked before when Burt pointed out a car parked along the side.

"That's Ned's car," he said. "They must have parked here so they could sneak down to the river without being seen."

The officer driving the car, Officer Hendrix, pulled up behind Ned's car and parked. He and his partner, a woman named Officer Montoya, got out and waved down the police car that was following theirs. The two officers in it also climbed out.

Officer Montoya quickly spotted the prints from Nancy and Ned's snowshoes. "We'll follow these," she announced. "If we lose the trail, then we'll still have Ms. Fayne's tracking app."

"Right, so we get to come along?" George asked.

"If your friends are in trouble, we can use all the help we can get," Officer Hendrix replied. "Now let's get going."

It was simply enough to follow the tracks. It hadn't snowed at all, and so they were clear and crisp. As the search party expected, they led down to the river and out onto the ice. The moon was still casting enough light for them to see by in any places that were no overshadowed by trees, and so their attention was immediately captured by the jagged hole in the ice just ahead of them.

After staring at it in horror for a second or two, George went dashing down to the ice. Burt and Dave only hesitated a moment before following her. George would have run straight to the edge of the hole, but Burt caught her arm and slowed her down so that they approached the hole at a more cautious pace.

"Someone must have fallen through here," Burt said, stating the obvious.

"You don't think…" George began, hardly daring to say the words.

"No, I don't think," Officer Hendrix interrupted her. He and the other officers had caught up by this time. "Someone fell through, that much is clear, and that's serious enough on its own. But if you look at the tracks, I'd say someone pulled them out. It looks like that person then helped them along. We'd better hurry. Unless they got to shelter quickly, the person who fell through wouldn't last very long in this cold."

That was all the group needed to hurry on their way. They continued following the tracks up the hill and into the trees, and to the front door of the cabin. Officer Hendrix stepped up to the door and knocked. There was no response at first, and so he knocked again and called, "Police."

"I'm coming," Ned's voice called from inside. He opened the door a minute later. "Am I glad to see all of you."

"Thank goodness you're all right," George said. "What about Nancy?"

There was no need for Ned to answer this question, because at that moment, Nancy came into the main room. The officers, Burt, Dave, and George entered the cabin, and they all sat down.

"What happened?" George demanded. "You never called, and we saw that huge hole in the ice. Did one of you fall through?"

"Uh, yeah," Ned admitted, a little sheepishly. "That was me. If it hadn't been for Nancy and Jack…Wait a minute. Where's Jack?"

Nancy sprang up from her seat on the couch and went to the bathroom door to knock. There was no answer, so she pushed open the door, which was already standing ajar. "He's not in there," she announced, "and he's not in the bedroom. Maybe he went for help after all, but I don't know why he wouldn't have told us."

"Who's Jack?" Dave asked.

"He's a kid who helped pull me out of the river and showed us this cabin," Ned replied. "He said he was going to stay here."

"He didn't even tell us his last name," Nancy added, "so we don't have any way of even contacting him, unless you officers know him. He said he used to live around here, but it doesn't sound like he still does."

"I don't know him right off," Officer Hendrix said, "but I'll make inquiries about him. I'm curious about this kid myself."

"In the meantime, there's something I need to show you." Nancy led the party into the bedroom and showed them the electronics equipment in the dresser drawer and how it had been used to manufacture the "ghost". "Jack said that this cabin belongs to people named Rodgers."

"As in Liam Rodgers?" Burt asked with one eyebrow raised.

"It could be," Nancy said. "I think it's worth looking into, anyway."

"And the sooner, the better," Dave added. "If Liam has something to do with that ghost, he must know where Bess is. Let's go."

Officer Montoya was already on her radio, calling in to headquarters both to report their findings at the cabin and the possibility that Jack was lost in the woods. Nancy supplied a description of Jack. "There's a road fairly close in back of here. We can call an ambulance and have them pick you up," she offered Ned.

"I'm fine," Ned assured her. "I just needed to warm up, really, and I have."

"I think you'd be better off having a doctor confirm that," Officer Montoya insisted.

"Besides," George spoke up, "going back to the hospital wouldn't be such a bad idea. We can check up on Norden and find out if Eliot is in cahoots with Liam."

"What?" Nancy asked. "Norden's in the hospital and you're suspecting Eliot of having something to do with it?"

The others explained what had happened to Norden and about Dave's suspicions concerning Eliot. Nancy and Ned listened with both interest and concern, and in the end, Ned agreed to go to the hospital, although he insisted that calling an ambulance was not necessary and that he could walk back to where his car and the police cars were parked.

When they arrived at the hospital, Officer Brady was still detaining Eliot and asking him some pointed questions. Eliot was clearly uncomfortable and was trying to squirm out of the interrogation.

"What is this?" he asked when he saw the newcomers. "I'm starting to think you guys think I'm the one who tried to kill Norden and who kidnapped Bess."

"Are you?" George asked with her arms folded.

Eliot gave her an incredulous look. "I was with you guys the entire time both those things were happening."

"It doesn't mean that you weren't still involved in it," George insisted. "Maybe you were supposed to be distracting us."

"Hold on," both Nancy and Officer Montoya warned George at the same instant. They looked at one another, and Nancy nodded to Officer Montoya to continue talking.

"We don't have any proof that you're involved in any way, yet," Officer Montoya said. "However, if you are involved, we have some leads that should prove that in a matter of hours. Considering that a man has nearly been murdered and there is still a young woman's life hanging in the balance, I would encourage you to do the right thing and tell us anything you do know about it. If you're involved, the court will certainly take your decision right now into consideration."

"But I don't know anything," Eliot insisted. "What little I do know, I already told this officer here." He pointed to Officer Brady.

Officer Brady gestured for Hendrix and Montoya to step to the side with him. Nancy lingered just close enough to hear what they said.

"His story holds together," Officer Brady told them. "I think he's telling the truth. Anyway, we don't have anything to hold him on."

They conferred for a few more minutes, and in the end, Montoya and Hendrix must have agreed with Brady, because they informed Eliot that he was free to go and that they had no further questions for him.

"Thanks for that," Eliot replied sarcastically, "but if it's all right with all of you, I'm going to stay right here until I can talk to Norden. That doctor said he was out of surgery and that it would be a good thing if a friend was around when he's able to start having visitors."

Officer Hendrix turned to Nancy and her friends. "You know this Liam Rodgers whom you suspect of being involved in this?"

"He's in the same fraternity as Burt, Dave, and me," Ned replied.

"Then, Burt, Dave, why don't you come along with us so we can hopefully find him and start questioning him," Hendrix requested. "Since you seem to know the most about all of this, Nancy, it might be helpful if you come along as well."

Nancy glanced uncertainly at Ned.

"It's fine, Nancy," Ned assured her. "It will only a minute for a doctor to look at me and say I really am fine anyway."

"And when he does, I'll give Ned a ride to wherever you guys are at, unless the doctor says he needs to stay in bed," George offered. Even though she was eager to actively join in searching for Bess, she also thought it would be better if someone stuck around the hospital to keep an eye on Eliot.

Nancy, Burt, and Dave followed Officers Hendrix and Montoya to their car and climbed into the back seat as Officer Hendrix headed toward the college.


	15. Another Victim

J.M.J.

_Author's note: As always, thank you for continuing to read, and especially if you have left any reviews. I hope you're enjoying the story!_

**Chapter XV**

**Another Victim**

It was a long, dull wait for George in the waiting room of the hospital. It was made all the longer by the fact that George would check the time on her phone every ten minutes or so, it seemed, only to find that it had only been a fraction of that time. She was worried for Bess, and she really would have rather gone and looked for her than stay here, but she realized that she would be the least helpful of any of her friends for confronting Liam Rodgers, so she had elected to stay here, where she could be of some help once Ned was discharged.

The one thing she hadn't expected was that there would be any developments in the hospital itself. However, after she had been waiting there for a little more than fifteen minutes, a red-haired girl came running into the emergency wing, calling for help as she held a cloth against her head. The receptionist and Officer Brady, who was still on duty waiting for Norden to wake up and be able to tell what had happened to him, rushed to assist her. George considered doing the same, but she realized that she would only be in the way of the more professional help.

"What happened, miss?" the receptionist asked, helping the girl to sit in one of the chairs.

"Someone hit me over the head," the girl explained after taking a deep breath or two to calm herself. Her voice sounded familiar to George, and as she remove the cloth from her head, George realized with a start that she was none other than Hadley Bowen. "I must have been knocked out for a long time. I don't know exactly. When I woke up, I was tied up in this cellar. There were some glass bottles on a shelf. I knocked them down and they broke. I used the broken glass to cut the ropes and since the window wasn't locked, I was able to climb out. I grabbed this cloth on the way since my head was still bleeding and came straight here."

George and Eliot had gravitated toward the group by this time. "Did you see anyone else?" George asked, as at the same instant, Eliot asked, "Are you okay?"

Hadley looked up a little uncertainly at them. "What are you guys doing here?"

"It's a long story," George replied.

Officer Brady motioned for her and Eliot to back off a little. Then he told them in a low tone, "We'll take care of this."

"But she's a friend of mine," Eliot protested.

"And she's mixed up in this whole case somehow," George added. "It's pretty coincidental that she got kidnapped the same night as Bess. The same person might have kidnapped them both."

"That's possible," Officer Brady admitted.

Hadley groaned. "I feel terrible. I think I'm going to be sick."

The receptionist waved over a doctor who was passing by and explained the situation to him. He had Hadley taken to a room. Officer Brady requested to follow, explaining that Hadley might have information pertinent to a kidnapping case.

George tapped her foot impatiently as she watched Officer Brady enter the emergency room. While she was waiting, Ned came out of the room where he had been getting treated.

"The doctor says I'm completely fine," Ned announced. "Nancy and Jack did just fine taking care of me."

"Good," George replied. "I suppose you are supposed to go right back to your fraternity house and go to bed, though."

"Well, that is what he recommended," Ned admitted. "But I wouldn't be able to get any sleep until we hear from Nancy and the others. Have you heard anything?"

"Not from them, but there was a development." George explained about Hadley's entrance and what she had told about her abduction.

"That does sound like we should stick around to hear," Ned agreed, " although if it was the same person who kidnapped both her and Bess, why wouldn't they have been put in the same place?"

George shrugged. "It's hard to say. Besides, if we stay here long enough, maybe we can learn what happened to Norden."

As it happened, both pieces of information came at nearly the same time, with Officer Brady relaying both to George and Ned, as well Eliot, who hovered near enough to hear. Norden was out of surgery and stable with the doctor pronouncing him out of danger. His story was short enough. He denied that anyone had threatened him, and he claimed that he hadn't seen the person who stabbed him. Officer Brady shared the doubts of George, Ned, and Eliot regarding this, both in view of the message that Eliot had found as well as the fact that Norden had been stabbed from the front and must have been conscious as the time since he had no other injuries save a few bruises that were probably the result of falling. He also refused to talk about his deceased wife or any other questions that Officer Brady posed to him, and the doctor insisted that the officer let him rest.

Hadley's story was far more colorful. She repeated her account of her abduction and subsequent escape, adding that she had left the dance shortly before that in order to avoid Liam Rodgers whom she was already suspicious of him. She was also able to give the address of the house where she had been held, and she affirmed that she had never seen her attacker nor any other person, although she highly suspected Liam. She said that these suspicions stemmed from the fact that Eliot had told her about the threatening message to Norden. Later, at the dance, she had overheard Liam talking on his phone and he had mentioned Norden's name. Hadley had come closer to listen, and had heard Liam saying that Norden was going to pay for the past. Liam had caught her listening, but Hadley had pretended that she hadn't heard anything of importance. She tried to relay the information to Bess, but Liam had interrupted them. A few minutes after that, she had snuck out of the dance through the back, but she must have been followed, because she had hardly gotten fifteen yards away before she was struck.

"This definitely confirms that Liam is part of the plot," Ned commented, "but he must have some accomplices. There was the one he was talking to and probably more besides. I don't think just two men could carry out everything they pulled tonight."

"They also had to have kidnapped Bess," George said. "They might be holding her at the same place as Hadley, just in a different room or something."

"Right," Officer Brady agreed. "I'll call for backup and we'll head out there immediately."

"I'll call the others and tell them," George added. "Liam probably isn't even at the fraternity house." She called Burt's phone, and he picked up right away. Immediately, George began telling him what they had learned, beginning with, "Liam is definitely in on the plot."

"Yeah," Burt said. "We kind of gathered that from what we found in his room."

NDNDNDNDND

Earlier, the police car stopped in front of the Omega Chi Epsilon fraternity house. Nancy, Burt, Dave, and the two officers climbed out and approached the mostly dark building. Only a few of the bedrooms had lights on.

"That's Liam's room," Dave said in an undertone, pointing toward one of the darkened windows.

"Okay," Officer Hendrix said. "Montoya and I will go first. If any of the other men in the fraternity ask any questions, you three talk to them. We can't have anybody alerting Rodgers before we get to his room."

"Hopefully his light being off means that he's asleep and not that he's gone," Officer Montoya observed.

Burt unlocked the door, and the group headed inside. It was strange to be sneaking around these hallways, which were so familiar. Fortunately, though, they only met one other Omega Chi Epsilon boy, who was more than willing to comply to the request for silence as soon as he saw Nancy and the police. Within a few minutes, they were standing outside Liam's door.

Hendrix gestured for Nancy and the boys to stand down the hallway a long way. Then he drew his gun and nodded at his partner as he took up a position on one side of the door. Montoya nodded back and took up a position on the other side of the door, drawing her gun as well. Then she reached over and gave the door a sharp rap with her knuckles.

"Open up! Police!" she shouted.

There was no response from inside. After waiting a minute or so, she tried the handle. It was locked.

"Is there anyone who would have the key to this door?" she asked Burt and Dave.

"No one we could get very fast," Dave replied. "Just go ahead and kick it down. I'll pay for the door if need be."

"Should we?" Officer Montoya asked her partner.

Officer Hendrix hesitated, but then he must have decided the situation warranted speedy action because he nodded. He put his gun back in its holster and then stepped in front of the door. With a swift, precise kick, he hit it just so that the lock broke and the door flew open. He shone his flashlight into the room, but it was still and empty.

The hall, on the other hand, was soon flooded with boys who had been roused by the sound of the door being kicked and were now asking what was going on. Hendrix and Montoya asked Burt and Dave to keep them out while they examined the room. Nancy followed them inside.

Liam was one of the fortunate boys who had his own room. At first glance, it looked like an ordinary college boy's room, with a few posters on the wall, some dirty clothes on the floor, a sloppily-made bed, and several electronics mixed in with the textbooks on the desk.

"We've got probable cause, so go ahead and start looking around," Officer Hendrix told his partner.

Along with Nancy, they began opening drawers and notebooks without finding anything out of the ordinary. Then Nancy opened the door to the closet and paused in surprise.

"You'd better take a look at this," she told the officers.

The closet was small and shallow and completely empty of clothes. The back wall had an enlarged map of the campus taped to it with several red markings and pins which formed a path. There were also pictures of Norden with various notes scribbled on them.

"It looks like something you'd find in a TV conspiracy theorist's room," Nancy observed, "or a stalker's."

"This definitely settles it that Rodgers was stalking Norden," Officer Hendrix agreed. He peered more closely at one of the pictures, one of the few that didn't have Norden in them. "What's this? A headstone? It's too far away to read what's on it, though."

"A headstone," Nancy repeated. "That's funny…"

Before she could speak her thought, Officer Montoya held up a planner that had been lying on Liam's desk. "There's an entry for this morning at five. That's in about fifteen minutes. It says 'Review at J.D.' Any ideas where that could be?"

"One," Nancy replied. "It's just a hunch, but if I have a feeling it's right."


	16. Rescue Mission

J.M.J.

_Author's note: Thanks for continuing to read and especially for any and all reviews! One more chapter to go of finishing the climax and wrapping things up._

**Chapter XVI**

**Rescue Mission**

Officer Brady didn't put up too much of an argument when George and Ned insisted on coming along to the address Hadley had given as the place where she had been held hostage. A battalion of other officers would meet them there, and they would storm the place if need be. Being the closest ones to the scene, Brady and his two passengers arrived first.

It was an ordinary, one-story house with a garage and a front door set well back in an alcove. The garage door was closed, cutting off any escape in that direction. However, there was probably a back door, and there were certainly windows that anyone in the house might use to escape if they were desperate enough.

George was impatient to go inside, with or without backup. "Who knows what they could be doing to Bess right this instant? It would be horrible if we arrived even a minute too late."

"It would also be horrible if we got ourselves all killed," Brady replied. "Just hold on. The backup will be here any minute." Though the words themselves were calm, it was obvious from Brady's tone that he was impatient and nervous himself.

A minute ticked by slowly without any backup putting in an appearance, then another three or four. George was about to repeat her request to charge right in when something caught the attention of all three watchers. A girl who looked as if she was still in high school came down the street, looking all around her as if she was nervous and suspected someone might be watching her. Then she went to the door and knocked.

There was a pause, and then finally the door opened. Whoever was on the other side didn't let the girl in nor did he or she open the door wide enough to be seen. Officer Brady rolled his window down in hopes of overhearing the conversation, but both parties were speaking in much too low tones to be heard.

"I could try sneaking closer," George offered in a whisper.

"No," Brady told her. "If you accidentally alert them that we're watching them, you'll only hurt our chances of getting to Bess. Just hold on. Backup should be here any second."

The conversation between the girl and the person in the house only lasted a few seconds longer, but still there was no sign of the backup arriving. Finally, the girl shrugged and started walking away. The door closed immediately. As it happened, the girl walked directly toward the parked patrol car. As she started past, she gave it a casual glance, but she didn't change her pace.

"Excuse me, miss," Officer Brady called out his window, making a quick decision to take the chance. "Could I talk to you for a second?"

The girl stopped and looked at him for a moment, confusion but not fear evident in her face. "Uh, okay. Why?"

"I noticed that you stopped at that house over there." Brady pointed it out. "I'd just like to ask you some questions about it."

"There's nothing wrong with that house," the girl insisted immediately. "You must have the wrong place if you're doing a stake-out of it."

"I don't think so," Brady replied. "I'm Officer Brady. What's your name?"

"Mandy Gillespie," the girl said, a little uncertainly. "What do you think is going on in that house? It's nothing. That's just my boss's house."

"What's your boss's name?" Brady asked.

"Clark Ransen." Mandy hesitated. "This isn't about the sabotage to the Winter Festival, is it?"

"Do you know something about it?" Brady countered.

"Well, no, not really," Mandy admitted. "It's just…It's not really even a police matter, I'm sure."

"Why don't you tell me about it, anyway?" Brady requested.

Mandy peered into the back seat and noticed Ned and George. "Who are these two? They're not cops."

"I'm Ned," Ned told her. "Mandy. Aren't you the girl who works in Maintenance? Our friends, Bess and Dave, told us about you."

"Oh, are you more friends of Nancy Drew?" Mandy asked. She took a deep breath was she hesitated. "There must be more going on than I realized. Well, I guess I'd better tell you what I do know, even though it's not very much."

"Go ahead and get in the car," Officer Brady told her, opening the passenger door for her. "We don't want anyone to see you talking to us."

Mandy climbed in and put her hands up against the heater in the car's dashboard. "That feels much better, anyway. Okay, so, my boss, Clark, is the head of Maintenance for the college, obviously. I found out that he's actually helping the guy that's been doing the sabotage."

"What guy is that?" George broke in.

"I don't know. Just some guy. I've never seen him, and I don't know his name. Anyway, Maintenance has someone on duty seven days a week, which I hate, but that's not important right now. I was on duty yesterday evening, and so was Clark. I got to work almost half an hour early, just 'cause. I walk into the office without knocking, because, ya know, why would you knock? Clark's right in the middle of a phone call, saying he'll have the lights ready to go off just at the right time. So, obviously, I'm all like 'What?' and Clark's all like 'Oh, uh, I gotta go' to the person on the phone, and then he tries to tell me that that wasn't anything just something unrelated to work, and I'm not buying it, so finally he sees that there's no point lying, so he admits it that he's helping with the sabotage but it's not a big deal, it's just a joke, and I'm not going to tell anyone and make him lose his job, right? I agreed, but I couldn't get to sleep last night thinking about it, so finally I came over here to talk to him about it. He said the same thing: it's no big deal and I should just forget it."

Just then, another police car pulled up behind Brady's, and two officers got out of it. They told him that there were other units around the block, and so they were ready to go in.

"Wow. Clark really is in trouble, isn't he?" Mandy asked. "Can I stay here and watch?"

"I think you'd better," Officer Brady replied. "We might have some more questions for you. Ned, George, you stay here with her. We'll call you once it's safe to come in."

George opened her mouth to protest, but then she closed it again. Holding things up wouldn't help Bess, she realized, and the police would be better able to handle things than she would. Even so, she was on the edge of the seat as she watched the police approach the house.

Ned was also tense, but he showed it far less. He sat back in the seat and thought over what they had just learned. "Mandy," he asked suddenly, "how do you know it was a guy that Clark is working with if you never saw him and just heard a tiny bit of one phone conversation?"

Mandy paused. "I'm not completely sure. It's just the impression I got. Maybe Clark said 'he' and 'him'. That must be it. I know he didn't say 'she' or 'her'."

That answered that question, so Ned settled back into thinking. Meanwhile, the officers had reached the door and knocked on it. There was no answer, but the watchers in the car could hear what was happening over the radio in the car. When the police had identified themselves, the suspect had tried to flee out the back way. The officers who were waiting in the backyard took off in pursuit of him. The next thing that came over the radio was Officer Brady informing Ned, George, and Mandy that the suspect had been captured and it was safe for them to enter the house. George practically flew across the street, although Ned and Mandy weren't slow in following her.

They found the officers in the kitchen, which was the first room in the house, with a handcuffed man sitting in a chair and looking determined not to talk. He started a little when he saw Mandy enter the room.

Mandy shook her head at him. "What do you think you're doing, Clark?"

"What's more important is, where's Bess?" George demanded bluntly.

She thought she saw a slight quiver of fear in Clark's eyes before he resolutely turned away and muttered, "I want a lawyer."

"If she's somewhere in the house, we can find her," Ned told her. "Let's go."

George needed no more urging, especially after she saw the glimmer of worry that reflected in Clark's features. With the help of most of the officers and Mandy, who didn't even fully understand what was going on, they began practically turning the house over.

Ned and George headed to the basement first, since that was where Hadley had said she had been held. It was unfinished and appeared to be a single, mostly empty room, lined with shelves.

"Bess, where are you?" George called in desperation. There was a beat of silence, and then George thought she heard a thumping from behind the wall. "Ned, I think there's a door hidden behind one of these shelves." She started straining at the one nearest to where the sounds seemed to come.

Ned joined her, and together they were able to pull the shelf out a couple of feet. George peered behind it to see a door there. Without waiting to pull the shelf out any more, she squeezed behind it and pushed the door, which fortunately opened in the other direction, open.

The room beyond was dark, but in the feeble beam of light from the main room in the basement, George could just make out the shape of someone lying on the floor.

"Bess!"

NDNDNDNDND

Burt hung up the phone from talking with George just as the party reached the cemetery. He pulled the collar of his jacket up over his nose and shivered. "What kind of people would use a cemetery for a meeting place?"

"The kind who are interested in ghosts," Nancy replied as she looked around her. The cemetery was eerie with the snow-covered headstones. "There was the picture of the headstone in Liam's room, to begin with, and 'J.D.' from his notes could stand for 'Jack Delance'. Jack, the kid Ned and I met earlier, told me that Jack Delance is buried in the cemetery, contrary to the legends."

"Okay, but how do we find his grave?" Officer Montoya asked. "The cemetery's fairly big, and it's still dark out. If we all look around with flashlights, we're bound to alert anyone who's approaching that we're here."

Nancy thought about this for a few moments. "It would be in an older section of the cemetery, one that isn't visited very often. With all the attention that the legend has been getting lately, if anyone would have noticed Jack's grave, they would have talked about it."

"Let's try in the back part, then," Officer Hendrix suggested. "I don't think anyone's been buried back there for more than fifty years."

The group headed toward the back section of the cemetery. The headstones there were mostly the old-fashioned kind that stood up well above the ground, and many of them were leaning, looking sad and abandoned in the snow. The searchers shone their flashlights on each one in turn, watching for one that bore Jack Delance's name.

Finally, Dave called the others over. His light was shining on a short and utterly unimpressive stone that read, "Jack Delance, 1852-1867".

"This must be it," he said. "Now what do we do? Just wait for someone to show up?"

Officer Montoya checked the time on her watch and shook her head. "It's past five by now. If there was going to be a meeting here, it would have started by now. It looks like we guessed wrong."

"Then let's go see if they've found Bess," Dave suggested.

Nancy cast a glance at him. She was disappointed that her guess had been wrong, but since she was, there didn't seem to be any way of catching Liam tonight. She was about to agree with Dave when she heard a sound behind her.

She turned and froze for a moment when she saw a bluish light standing only a few feet away in the rough outline of a person.


	17. The Capture

J.M.J.

_Author's note: Thank you for reading and especially reviewing! May I present to you the last chapter:_

**Chapter XVII**

**The Capture**

Burt, Dave, and the two officers noticed the ghostly figure a moment after Nancy did, and there were gasps from all of them. They knew by now that it wasn't real, that it was just a projection on a sheet, but for the moment, it was so close and so lifelike that they weren't quite sure they believed it. Even Nancy was taken aback, especially when the specter's vague outline began to solidify.

After a few seconds, the shape became the definite image of a boy with distinct features, though still glowing blue and still with something off about him. Nancy realized a moment later that it was his eyes. He had no pupils or irises, just empty, ice-blue orbs.

"What do you want?" She addressed the question off to the side; she knew the phantom wasn't real and couldn't respond.

It was a shock, then, when the boy replied in the same voice that Nancy had heard earlier, both at the river and over the phone. "Peace."

Nancy smiled slightly. "You know I don't believe in ghosts. You know I already know how you're pulling off this illusion. Let's stop playing games."

There was a pause, and then the projection disappeared. A dark figure stepped out from behind a tree, the unmistakable outline of a gun in his hand.

"No use trying to fool you, Nancy Drew," Liam's voice said. "I know when I'm beat, and I'm beat. I'm not ready to completely throw the towel in, though, so if you officers would kindly put your hands high enough that you won't be tempted to reach for your guns, we can talk without any interruptions."

The officers obeyed, but Nancy folded her arms. "What are you really after, Liam?" she asked. "You lured us out here to meet you, didn't you?"

Liam chuckled. "You're flattering yourself, Nancy. You've just been in the way since you came to Emerson, and I've just been trying to get you out of the way. I thought you'd at least go look for your friend. Some loyalty."

Nancy ignored the jibe. "Why did you try to kill Professor Norden?"

"Can't you guess, Nancy? You're the great detective. I'll give you a hint. You saw quite a few headstones out here. Whose headstone didn't you see?"

"I didn't see nearly enough headstones to figure that out, but I'll take a guess," Nancy replied. "Claire Norden's. Are you blaming Norden somehow for his wife's death? But what would that have to do with you?"

"No, his ex-wife's death," Liam corrected her.

Nancy shook her head. "The obituary said they were still married."

"The obituary written by a family friend who didn't want to dredge up all that garbage," Liam spat out. "Okay, it was technically true. They were separated for almost seven years before she died, but they never actually got a divorce. Claire wanted one. She found another man she wanted to marry, but Norden wouldn't give it to her, even though this other man needed her. He had a young son, you see, who had to grow up without a mother first because of a flake of a biological mother who ran off and second because Norden was too stubborn to let go of someone he didn't even want anyway."

"I think even I can figure out the rest from here," Burt broke in. "This guy's name was Rodgers and his son's name was Liam. You really liked Claire and wanted her for a stepmother. It still doesn't explain how Norden was supposedly responsible for her dying."

Liam sighed. "Of course, you wouldn't be able to see it. Well, might as well tell the whole story, so you can know what kind of a man you saved. Claire went to talk to him, one last time, fifteen years ago. My dad went with her, because she was afraid to go alone. It was winter, like this, but that old fool was out in the woods trying to track down the ghost of Jack Delance. It was nighttime, but Claire wanted to get it over with, so they went down to the river to see if they could find him. He was down there, sure enough, out on the frozen river itself doing his ghost-hunting bit. They called to him from the shore, but he wouldn't come in. Finally, Claire had had enough, so she walked out to meet him. She stepped on a patch of thin ice and fell through. My dad rushed to help her, but Norden ran off. Dad pulled her out and got her to the hospital, but she developed pneumonia and a bunch of other complications. She held on for another couple of months, but Norden never even called to see how she was. Some other friends of hers arranged the funeral. They didn't even want Dad anywhere near.

"So, last summer, I decided to make Norden's life miserable before I got my revenge on him. I transferred here to Emerson, started taking classes from Norden. I rigged up the whole ghost of Jack Delance thing to bring back plenty of wonderful memories for him, sent him some messages, both paper and electronic. For some extra class, I used Claire's old phone number as the number that the spoofing system brought up. I figured he'd recognize it. I also did some other acts of sabotage so plenty of other people would notice and be coming up to him and asking, 'Why aren't you looking into the ghost?'"

"And then when Nancy came, you knew her reputation, so you figured you would have to distract her," Dave concluded. "Isn't kidnapping Bess and Hadley a little much?"

There was just enough light from the eastern horizon to show a fleeting look of confusion on Liam's face. "I was in this to make Norden pay for practically murdering Claire. The only way he could pay for that was to die himself. There was nothing I could do that would make things any worse for me if I got caught at that point."

Nancy shivered, but she noticed out of the corner of her eye that Officer Hendrix had been slowly lowering his hands without Liam noticing. Now he was pressing down the button on his radio. Someone at headquarters would notice before long and come looking for them. All they had to do was stall.

"You couldn't have pulled this off by yourself," Nancy said, directing her attention back to Liam.

"No," Liam admitted. "I bribed the maintenance guy, Clark, to help me with the sabotage and the apparitions. Turned out if you paid him enough, he was down for anything. Very handy guy to have around."

"But he wasn't the only one," Nancy continued.

"Yes, he was. There wasn't anyone else."

"There's no need to feel bad about throwing her under the bus," Nancy said. "She's already done the same to you, several times."

Liam shook his head in an unconvincing attempt to look as if he had no idea what Nancy was talking about. "There wasn't anyone else."

"Hadley was in on the scheme," Nancy said, "but not all the way. I'm guessing she thought that you were just playing a harmless prank on a professor and she has enough of a sense of humor to be willing to go along with that. Once she found out what you were really doing, she knew she had to get out and stop you, but she was afraid to admit to her part in the plan. First, she alerted me to the fact that you were using Claire Norden's number and got us her name in a way that I thought was a little too convenient even then. She tried to talk to Eliot earlier tonight, but got cold feet. Then she tried to talk to Bess, and when you interrupted got scared off again. She never was kidnapped. I was sure of that the first time I heard her story from Burt, and you confirmed it a minute ago with how surprised you looked hearing about it. She said she was knocked out immediately after leaving the dance, but she came to the hospital hours later with her head still bleeding. I figured from that alone that she had to be lying about where she got her head injury. I still don't know where she got that, but I do know she came to the hospital specifically to tell the police where Bess was being held."

Liam raised his eyebrows. "That little sneak. It doesn't matter, though, I guess. The plan's ruined, thanks to you, Nancy, and Hadley, apparently, and that pest Eliot. He's been snooping around about the ghost and finding out way too much. Hadley was supposed to tip him off to come to my dorm room so he could find the convenient clues that led you here and Clark and I could deal with him. We figured he'd be a little easier to deal with than Nancy and her whole troupe of friends, anyway. When the plan started blowing up tonight, we canceled that – Hadley didn't even do her part, anyway – but then I saw the police car outside the dorm and knew the game was up. I figured I might as well meet you out here and go out in a blaze of glory."

"I don't see how stupidly getting yourself caught is going out in a blaze of glory," Dave replied.

Liam smiled. "I have the drop on you three and the two cops. If I shoot straight enough, I could take you all out with me." He raised the gun and pulled back the hammer.

NDNDNDNDND

George rushed to Bess's side, with Ned following as close as he could, although he had a little harder time squeezing behind the door than George did. By the time he reached the girls, George had already pulled the gag out of Bess's mouth and was working on the knots binding her hands. Ned went to work on the ropes on her ankles.

Bess sighed heavily. "Thank goodness you guys found me. I was starting to think they were planning on just leaving me here to starve." Once her hands were free, she wrapped both her rescuers in a giant hug. Then she pulled back, a look of confusion on her face. "Wait. Where's Dave? And Nancy and Burt?"

"Long story," George replied, speaking briefly to avoid sounding overly emotional. "Can you stand up?"

"I twisted my ankle." Bess looked at it. "Having the rope around it probably didn't help matters, either. If you guys help me, I think I can."

Ned offered her a hand and pulled her to her feet. She winced a little in pain, but her ankle didn't buckle under her. With help from both her friends, she was able to hobble out of the little room once Ned had pushed the bookshelf farther to the side, and then up the stairs.

They met the officers, who asked Bess several solicitous questions and pulled out a chair for her to sit in. Mandy stared at her, wide-eyed, and turned an accusing look toward Clark, who was trying keep any vestige of emotion from his countenance. Then Officer Brady turned to Ned and George.

"I just got a call from headquarters," he said. "Your friends are out at the cemetery with Officers Hendrix and Montoya. We need to get out there right away."

NDNDNDNDND

The eastern sky was growing lighter every moment as Nancy tensed every muscle as she heard the hammer on Liam's gun cock. The time had suddenly run out, and a false move now would mean disaster.

"You don't want to do this, Liam," Officer Montoya said from behind Nancy. "You haven't killed anyone yet, and you're not going to escape. If you pull that trigger, you'll never see the outside of a jail again."

"Or I'll never see the inside. No one's taking me alive." Liam turned the gun toward himself. "There's nothing more for me. You said so yourself. Why should I stick around for it, then?"

"Honestly, your 'blaze of glory' keeps getting less and less glorious," Burt said in a convincingly bored tone. "At least, when you were planning on killing us, it was a little bit more impressive."

Liam lowered the gun slightly. "What…?"

He didn't get the chance to continue the question, because as soon as his attention was diverted, if only for a moment, Nancy kicked a deluge of snow into his face. He staggered back, spluttering and waving his hands wildly. In a flash, Montoya had her own gun out of the holster, Hendrix had jumped forward to take Liam's weapon from him, and Dave had grabbed Nancy and Burt and pulled them to the ground lest Liam's gun go off before Hendrix could take it from him.

A moment later, Montoya was on the radio, calling in that they had a suspect in custody, and Hendrix was putting handcuffs on Liam. Nancy and the boys stood up, brushing the snow off themselves.

"I had things under control," Burt said.

"Yeah, we could see that," Dave replied dryly. "Now can we go see about Bess?"

"Yes, let's," Nancy agreed.

However, they were obliged to wait for police backup to arrive. They were surprised and thrilled to see George and Ned help Bess out of the back seat of the first car. Dave ran forward and caught Bess in a hug, and as soon as they could, Nancy and Burt also greeted her with hugs.

"Well, it looks like this one is about all wrapped up," Bess observed as she noticed Liam in handcuffs. "Unless there's more people in on the plot?"

"There's no evidence of any," Nancy replied, "but I don't think we quite have everything tied up yet."

"I guess I owe Eliot an apology," Dave commented. "It looks like he wasn't involved after all."

"Well, we did step right into a trap that was meant for him," Burt reminded him, "so maybe he can cut us a little slack there."

Nancy smiled. "True, but what I was thinking of was Jack. I hope he's all right."

"Yeah," Ned agreed. "I'd like to talk to him, now that I'm a little more coherent."

Officer Brady overheard the exchange and said, "We had a search party go out to the cabin. It's funny. They didn't find any sign of anyone leaving it in a different direction than the one all of you took. It hasn't snowed, he must have simply walked over the same path you took, but they can't find any indication that he left that path."

"That's not the only thing that's funny about it," Nancy said. "He was pretty vague about himself, and he mentioned that I should go out to the cemetery. Honestly, if I hadn't had that in the back of my mind…Well, Liam's clues were pretty obvious. We would have still figured it out, I guess."

"Nancy Drew, you're not saying you think that kid was actually a ghost or something, are you?" George asked incredulously.

"No," Nancy said. "It must have just been a coincidence. But you've got to admit, it was a pretty strange one."

_Author's note: Once again, thank you very, very much for reading this story! I hope you enjoyed it. Thank you especially to drogorath, angelicalkiss, Rose12, and Aurora Mandeville for your reviews throughout. I'll admit, this is the fewest reviews I've ever gotten on a story this long, which is a little disappointing, but it does mean that every review I did get meant even more. So thank you for them! Thank you also to any future readers who review! I'll still see those reviews and I'll still appreciate them, and if you have an account, I'll PM you to thank you personally._

_You're probably wondering about Jack - is he the ghost or not? I'm intentionally leaving that one vague in the story itself, because Nancy wouldn't have any way to acquire all the proof she would need to actually believe that he's a ghost. Plus, with the whole CW series making ghosts to some extent solve the mystery for Nancy, I've been kind of backing out of the idea of having him be a real ghost, but it was too late at that point. In my mind, though, yes, he is actually meant to be a ghost._

_That being said, there are a couple of things I want to mention. First, I really wanted to have a short Christmas story for this Christmas season, but at this point that's definitely not going to happen before Christmas. If I'm still in the mood, I might write it in January and post it then. Otherwise, I do have a Christmas story from last year that you might enjoy if you haven't read it yet: _Operation Santa Claus_. It's not as good as I think it is, but it's probably my favorite thing I've ever written, fanfiction or otherwise._

_Speaking of otherwise, I have finished my series of twelve mystery stories that I've published on Amazon. Yay! Well, not exactly finished. These twelve are short with an overarching mystery, but I plan on writing more in the future that can stand on their own. They're more for middle-school aged kids, but then so are Nancy Drew and the Hardy Boys, so you all might enjoy them anyway. If you want some more details, then shoot me a PM or mention it in a review._

_Since I'm not doing a Christmas story, it looks like this is it for my fanfiction for 2019. I'm planning on more in the future, but until life slows down a little, I don't have as much time as I would like to devote to writing, so I'm going to really focus on my original work for now. I'll be back soon, though. I have way too many ideas to abandon fanfiction altogether. ;)_

_Merry Christmas and may 2020 be a great year for you all!_

_hbndgirl_


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